Here are a few of the most interesting rappers out there!
10 - Oxxxymiron Russian rapper Miron Fyodorov,
aka Oxxxymiron, is a hard-hitting rapper who knows what it takes
to get things done. When he was nine, he moved with his parents to Germany, where his
accent and status as an immigrant made things hard for him. To cope with constant hardship,
he started writing lyrics and rapping when he was a teenager. At fifteen, he and his family
moved to London, and he graduated from Oxford University with a degree in English Literature.
You'd think it'd be smooth sailing for a guy with a fancy degree from one of the fanciest
universities in the world, but Oxxxymiron still couldn't catch a break. He couldn't get
a job because almost every place he went saw that degree and decided he was 'overqualified' for the
position. He resorted to working as a cashier, a translator, a loader, a guide, a stallman,
a tutor, an MC, and an office clerk. He also became a 'fixer' of sorts for well-off expats
in and around London. Still, he never stopped chasing his musical dreams.
Like Eminem, Oxxxymiron got his big break from rap battles. He was so dominant in these rap battles,
usually held in St. Petersburg, Russia, that he became known as 'The Russian Eminem.' As his
popularity grew, he started touring across Europe. He even became the CEO of a talent booking agency.
His rise from the underground inspired a British TV show about his life story.
Sometimes critical of Russia's leadership under Vladimir Putin's rule,
Oxxymiron would occasionally show up to the trials of political dissidents and lend his support.
In Russia, activism is a dangerous game. Many artists who speak out against the
Kremlin are labeled 'foreign agents' and sent off to cool their heels in prison.
In February of 2022, the day after Russia invaded Ukraine, Oxxxymiron made an announcement.
He had six sold-out shows lined up in Mosco and St. Petersburg, but he was canceling all of them.
He said he couldn't entertain the Russian people while Russian bombs
fell on Ukraine. Instead, he went on to headline
a series of concerts to benefit Ukrainian refugees crossing the border into Poland.
Of course, the concerts weren't held in Russia, and we doubt Putin is one of his loyal fans.
9 - FNF Chop FNF Chop,
known as A. Deonte Gaines when he's offstage, knows how to drop bars.
The up-and-coming rapper rose to stardom as many young musicians do today—through TikTok. However,
when his song "Walk Down" went viral, Chop got the news while sitting in his jail cell.
Chop first went to prison for possession of an
illegal firearm, but he didn't stay inside for long. Out on probation,
he was free to pursue his musical dreams. So he started recording… and he smoked a little weed.
Probation officers don't take too kindly to their parolees smoking weed, so they picked him up and
sent him back to prison to serve out the rest of his sentence. Back inside, Chop caught Covid
twice and continued writing lyrics, calling his manager and rapping to him every day. He posted
a video of his song "Walk Down" from the inside and hoped for the best. Unbelievably, the best
started to happen: the song exploded on TikTok. He saw thousands of videos set to the track,
and millions of people heard it. Days later, Chop was fielding calls from major record labels.
FNF Chop was living the dream… sort of. While kids on Tik Tok danced to his viral song,
he waited patiently for someone to open his cell. Finally, in December 2021,
Chop got out of jail and quickly hit the recording studio.
8 - Fast Money Ash Gabriel Molina and his friend Frayluis
Henriquez had a little scam going. Gabriel worked as a concierge at a fancy building in New York's
Upper West Side, where he was responsible for collecting the rent checks and sending them
to the bank. That was all a regular part of his job. However, before he sent them out, he snapped
a quick picture and sent the photos to Frayluis, who forged new checks with the real information.
It's one thing to forge a check. It's another altogether to deposit it and get money out without
giving yourself away. So, the duo turned to another friend: Ashley Bautista, aka "Young Ash."
Young Ash was an up-and-coming young rapper with a
huge social media following and over a million plays of her song
"Bababa." They recruited Ash to create posts for her bottomless pool of Instagram followers.
Their scheme worked for a while.
Ash posted images of herself posing with piles of cash and asked anyone who wanted to make some fast
money to hit her up. She even said it wasn't a scam. Once someone took the bait, the scammers
jumped into action. First, they sent someone over to collect the victim's ATM card. Then,
they'd deposit the fake checks into the victim's account, withdraw the money, and return the card.
Of course, people tend to notice when money disappears from their accounts from checks
they didn't write, so the scam only lasted two months before Young Ash, Molina, Henriquez,
and three others got arrested. Still, the gang made off with $62,000 before the jig was up.
Maybe Young Ash just needed some fast cash to pay for studio time. Maybe she needed it
for the likes. Either way, she finally made headlines - just not how she was hoping to.
7 - Criolo Brazilian rapper
Criolo isn't just in it for fame and money. Born to migrant parents in the megacity of Sao Paulo,
Criolo had a rough childhood. Like the greatest rappers,
Criolo started writing music as a way to cope with the world around him at a very young age,
There will always be plenty of poverty in a city of twelve million people like Sao Paulo. Criolo
experienced that firsthand when his family moved to one of the city's favelas - their
ultra-packed neighborhoods filled with people at the bottom end of society.
Today, Criolo uses his talent and voice to call attention to
the reality of Brazil's poorest class. He found that rapping is
the best way to address the tension and social issues that plague his society.
6 - Timati Imagine a cross between Vladimir Putin,
Vin Diesel, and Drake. Got a picture in your head? Good. It probably looks something like
Russian rapper Timati. Timati started on the Russian equivalent of America's Got Talent,
a show called 'Factory of Stars.' As time went on, he gave up the clean singer look,
covered himself with tattoos, and tried to pass himself off as a hardcore rapper. His track
"Welcome to St. Tropez" became a massive hit with over 174 million views on YouTube. Timati
flaunts his party boy lifestyle, flying around on a private jet and spending time at luxury resorts.
In Russia, a lifestyle like that tends to point in one direction: Vladimir Putin.
Not one to buck a trend, Timati is an avid supporter of the Russian leader and has been
photographed with him many times, often attending rallies in favor of ol' Vlad.
Timati didn't stop with music, though. He launched a clothing line with stores across the country,
then set out to start a burger empire. With all his success, we know Timati for one simple reason.
In 2019, he put a music video on YouTube that was so full of praise for Putin's government
and so homophobic that it became the most disliked Russian video on YouTube,
with more than 1.4 Million dislikes. He deleted the video not long after.
5 - Razzlekahn Heather Morgan is pretty clever.
She went to college and did pretty well, even impressing her economics professor.
She graduated with honors and worked in finance, eventually starting several companies
with her husband. She also contributed pieces to high-profile publications like Inc. and Forbes.
Sometime in 2018, Morgan fell victim to burnout. She needed a trip and hopped on a plane to Asia,
where she discovered a new passion—rapping. That's when her alter ego, Razzlekahn, was born.
Razzlekahn was the opposite of her buttoned-up professional life.
She went out of her way to be as weird as possible, dropping beats
with lyrics like I've got pirate blood. A real risk-taker. Pirate blood. A real money maker.
To most people, her lyrics were weird and nothing more. In the rear-view mirror, though,
they get a little clearer. While she was writing articles for executives
on how to protect themselves from cybercriminals,
she and her husband got busy carrying out one of the largest digital heists in history.
They hacked into the Bitcoin exchange Bitfinex and stole over 119,000 bitcoin. When they initially
stole the crypto in 2016, their bitcoin pool was worth millions of dollars. In 2022,
when the scam finally caught up with them, their stolen bitcoin was worth about $4.5 billion.
The feds got most of the coins back when they raided the couple's home,
but about 25,000 remain missing. Check out this video to learn even
more about the great Bitcoin heist by Razzlekahn by clicking here!
4 - Capital Bra Some rappers are pretty prolific,
releasing a few number-one hits a year. In Germany, Russian rapper Capital Bra takes that to
the next level. Unsurprisingly, Bra got his start with rap battles, releasing his first studio album
Kuku Bra in 2016. His next two albums, both released in 2017, made the top five charts.
In 2018, he put out his first number-one album, and another peaked at number two.
However, life wasn't all hit singles and chart-topping albums for Bra.
He was born in a small Siberian town and grew up in Ukraine.
He and his mother moved to Berlin in the early 2000s, and he found his passion for rap
at 11-years-old. He signed up for a German rap battle tournament, and the rest is history.
This Russian keeps cranking out German hits and has more than 1.4 billion streams with 21 number
one hits to his name. He's also known for weaving East Slovak and Arabic words into his songs.
3 - Money Bo Many remember
Dwayne Bowe for his impressive career playing Wide Receiver for the Kansas City Chiefs.
Over eight years, he raked in hundreds of catches and posted a career-high 15 touchdowns in 2010.
However, in 2015, Bowe didn't have the best time playing for the Cleveland Browns. Then again,
nobody did. Bowe's famous for signing a $13 Million dollar contract contract with 9 million
guaranteed with the browns….and only ever catching five passes for them. For those doing the math,
that's almost $2 Million per catch!
However, Dwayne hung up his cleats and donned the name Money Bo,
thus kick-starting his new rap career. According to his Spotify bio, Bowe always put music before
football. He never actually wanted to play. One fateful day in high school,
Bowe got in a fight. The football coach noticed and suggested Bowe channel that
aggressive energy into something else. At that moment, a star was truly born.
2 - Dan Sur Mexican rapper Dan Sur
gave new meaning to the name Goldilocks. However, instead of dying his hair like everybody else,
he took it one step further. He had golden hair surgically implanted in his head.
This rapper and reggaeton star shared the news with his over 4.3 million followers on TikTok
and made waves. He claims to be the first rapper to have gold hair implanted in human history.
Don't expect 4 million people to go out and do the same thing, though. Experts say this isn't a good
idea either. It involves surgically implanting hooks into the scalp, meaning this guy has literal
hooks… in his scalp. How does he sleep? How does he wash his head? Plus, isn't all that gold heavy?
Gold is also pretty expensive, so some people don't believe he did it, at least not with real
gold. To dispel these rumors, Dan Sur went back on TikTok to prove his chains were genuine by
removing one and putting it in a glass of water. If it were plastic, it would float—at least by his
logic. He didn't mention that lead also sinks in water. So does most plastic. Just ask the ocean.
1 - 2Pec
Australian rapper Terry Peck, aka 2Pec, has probably had a lot of ideas in his life.
But three of them were terrible. The first was calling himself 2Pec. No, not Tupac…2pec.
Just like it sounds. Maybe we’ve used the word rapper a bit too loosely by now!
The second terrible idea was racking up a $621 tab at Omeros Bros Seafood
Restaurant on the Gold Coast. His bill included a couple of lobsters,
twenty-one oyster shooters, an octopus, and plenty of beer to wash it all down.
The third, which followed immediately after the seafood beer, was to skip out on the bill. 2Pec
walked out of the restaurant, ran across the beach, and swam out into the ocean.
It didn't take long for police on jet skis to catch up with him and haul him back to shore.
Unfortunately, he was missing the clothes he'd jumped in with.
2Pec claims he left because his friend was giving birth on the beach and the lobster was overcooked.
If that were the case, a simple "can I speak with a manager" would have been the better option.
Click to watch one of these next videos!
And let us know in the comment section who would you rather listen to for 5 minutes,
Cardi B or anyone on this list?