Milwaukee’s hip-hop scene has reached a golden age.
Not that there hasn’t been significant success before.
Atlanta-based Arrested Development — led by Milwaukee native Speech — became the first hip-hop act to win the Grammy for best new artist. Coo Coo Cal had a No. 1 hit on Billboard’s Hot Rap Songs chart. Kinto Sol became award-winning pioneers for Spanish-language hip-hop. Rico Love and Bizness Boi produced tracks for A-list rappers.
But what we’re seeing now coming from Milwaukee artists is unprecedented.
For the first time, there are multiple local rappers signed to significant record deals. Music videos, TikTok snippets, tracks on Spotify featuring Milwaukee rappers are reaching hundreds of thousands, even millions of streams. Journalists from Pitchfork, Rolling Stone, The New York Times, Wired and other national outlets have taken notice, showering the city’s premiere players with praise and suggesting the creativity and sounds coming out of the city are one of a kind.
It’s a golden age, but Milwaukee hip-hop has a way to go. We’ve yet to see huge superstars come out of the scene, as they have from other long-heralded Midwestern hip-hop locales, including Chicago, Detroit and Minneapolis. Major head-turning gigs starring Milwaukee rappers in their hometown are still few and far between.