For the first time in 35 years, not a single rap song cracked the Billboard Hot 100’s Top 40.
That sentence alone felt unreal to write.
Hip-hop, the same genre that owned the charts, the culture, the streets, and the Super Bowl halftime show, vanished from America’s top songs list for two straight weeks this fall.
But to me, it wasn’t a surprise. This news is just a symptom of a larger debate that has been ongoing in music and entertainment.
The way we consume music and the way artists create it have completely changed. Every generation reshapes sound, and that’s natural. Somewhere between the rise of social media, streaming, and content creation, the soul has been stripped from the music industry. And hip-hop, the genre that built itself on authenticity and raw storytelling, is getting hit.
I grew up in an era when artists had artist development, when talent was groomed and trained. Artists’ talent alone wasn’t enough to have longevity, but their passion and hustle did. Labels invested in artists’ sound, image, and growth. You could hear the hunger in their voices, feel it in their lyrics. You couldn’t fake it, because the audience could tell.
Now, everything’s built for speed, quick listens, quick hits, quick fame. The music industry doesn’t want timeless anymore; it wants trendable. TikTok dances move more units than live performances. Playlists replace albums. A song doesn’t need depth; it just needs 15 seconds that sound good on a phone speaker.
And while everyone’s busy chasing streams, the quality’s gone to hell.
Streaming didn’t just change how we listen; it changed why we listen. Back when you had to buy a CD or vinyl physically, you invested in the artist. I remember going to Strawberry’s record store when a new album by an artist came out. I studied the cover and the contents inside, and had conversations with the guy behind the counter about the latest music that came out. It created a sense of community, excitement, and anticipation.
These days, music serves as background noise while scrolling through social media apps. It’s something that plays while you do something else.
So when Billboard says hip-hop’s market share has fallen from nearly 30% in 2020 to 24% this year, I get it. When I see the charts filled with pop and country acts borrowing hip-hop’s beats, I get that too. The sound didn’t disappear — it just got repackaged, stripped of its roots, and sold back to us without the flavor.
And while Billboard’s rule changes, removing “recurrent” songs might explain some of the chart drought, that’s not the real story. The real story is that the industry isn’t cultivating the next generation.
That’s why Megan Thee Stallion’s breaking the drought with her latest song “Lover Girl” debuting at No. 38 this month actually felt like there was a glimmer of hope. But it shouldn’t take a two-week drought to remind people that hip-hop still matters. And the genre, as far as I’m concerned, isn’t going to die.
I’m not going to lie, I’m still stuck on the early 2000s, 90s, and 80s era of music. It’s timeless, evergreen, and nostalgic. Maybe that makes me old-school. But I’ll take quality over streamable any day. I don’t even know many of these new artists [and I’ve tried to take my time and truly listen to the music], and honestly, I don’t know how much longevity they will have. I’m rooting for the underground artists to get the shine they deserve. There are too many artists who aren’t mainstream that should be in the spotlight right now.
The culture deserves better. The artists deserve better. We all do.
