 | | Rapper Lil' Boosie's hard Southern style comes from growing up in one of Baton Rouge, LA's more notorious neighborhoods, one that was known for drugs and gunplay. |
 | | Yo Gotti is among the many hardcore rappers who came out of hip-hop's Dirty South school in the late '90s. |
 | | The year 2005 was like yin and yang for Atlanta bling rapper Gucci Mane. He enjoyed success entering the charts with his first national hit, "Icy," became involved in a quarrel with that song's collaborator, Young Jeezy, and found himself facing murder charges in the Georgia courts. |
 | | Signed to Slip-N-Slide in 2004 after recording his first track, "Tell Dem Krackers Dat," the Ft. Myers, FL-based Plies built anticipation for his official debut album with a couple mixtape releases, along with an appearance on Trina's "So Fresh. |
 | | Atlanta-based Young Jeezy originally planned on having a background role in the music industry -- as a businessman, not as a rapper. |
 | | Atlanta rapper and T.I. protégé Young Dro decided to pursue a career in rap music in order to break the cycle of tribulations from hustling and inner-city life. |
 | | Crunk practitioner Lil Scrappy was born Darryl Richards in the ATL. Discovered by BME Recordings and Lil Jon, Scrap built his rep throughout the Southeast before breaking nationally in 2003 with the hit "Head Bussa. |
 | | Tattooed with pictures of AK-47s, Miami's six-foot, 300-pound rap figure known as Rick Ross embraced his city's reputation for drug trafficking on his debut single, "Hustlin'," in 2006. |
 | | Rapper Bun B (born Bernard Freeman) rose to fame in the duo UGK. Bun B and Pimp C formed UGK in the late '80s when their former crew, Four Black Ministers, fell apart. |
 | | Gorilla Zoe is an Atlanta rapper in the mold of Young Jeezy, whom he replaced in the Bad Boy group Boyz n da Hood. |
 | | Atlanta-born and bred trap rapper Shawty Lo, aka Carlos Walker, did not reach national prominence with his street-hustling raps, but by ushering in the "snap dance" craze with the Billboard-topping "Laffy Taffy" as part of his four-man crew, D4L, in 2005. |
 | | The Cash Money Millionaires included whatever rappers happened to rap for Cash Money Records at the given moment. |
 | | Based in Mobile, AL, rapper Rich Boy (born Maurice Richards) didn't enter the music industry until after he enrolled as a mechanical engineering major at Tuskegee University. |
 | | Rapper Yung Joc (born Jasiel Robinson) learned about running his own business from his father, who owned a hair-care products company. |
 | | Having come up in the Hot Boys group alongside superstar Lil Wayne, New Orleans rapper Juvenile is a Southern hip-hop veteran, and a chart-topping one as well, having climbed the U. |
 | | Born Antoine McColister in Port St. Lucie, Florida, Ace Hood was raised by his mother in Deerfield Beach, twenty miles north of Miami. |
 | | Once dubbed "the Jay-Z of the South" by Pharrell Williams, T.I. gradually came into his own and established himself as one of rap's most successful MCs during the early 2000s. |
 | | Waka Flocka, also known as Waka Flocka Flame, is a Southern rapper associated with Gucci Mane and his So Icey Entertainment enterprise. |
 | | When he's doing business, Cash Money Records CEO Bryan Williams uses his real name, but when he grabs the mike to spit Dirty South raps, Williams goes by the names Birdman or Baby. |
 | | Chicago rapper Twista made his recording debut on "Po Pimp," a platinum single by his fellow Windy City rappers Do or Die. |
 | | After sending their homeboy Lil Scrappy up the charts, the Atlanta-based label/management team Crunk Incorporated turned to the six-member Crime Mob for their next big hit. |
 | | At Atlanta's Miller Grove Middle School, two young wannabe rappers met up with each other, left their individual rap crews, and joined forces to become YoungBloodZ. |
 | | Philadelphia rapper Meek Mill, born Robert Williams, began releasing mixtapes in 2006, debuting with The Real Me. |
 | | One of the most thuggish rappers ever embraced by the mainstream, Trick Daddy broke out of the South in 2001 with "I'm a Thug" and established himself as an unlikely national superstar. |
 | | Southern rap group Dem Franchize Boyz includes members Gerald "Buddie" Tiller, Bernard "Jizzal Man" Leverette, Maurice "Parlae" Gleaton, and Jamall "Pimpin" Willingham. |
 | | Evolving slowly but steadily over the years, Three 6 Mafia began as an exploitative, horror-themed underground hardcore rap sensation ("666 Mafia," get it?) yet went on to enjoy relatively mainstream success years later, eventually winning an Oscar and scoring some major hits. |
 | | One half of the rap duo Crooked Lettaz, David Banner helped put Mississippi on the map in 1999. In 2000, he released his first solo album in Them Firewater Boyz, Vol. |
 | | B.G. was among the first rappers on Cash Money Records, and though he eventually departed from the label and forged his own path through the rap industry, he remains associated with Cash Money, with which he enjoyed his greatest success, most notably the epochal 1999 hit "Bling Bling. |
 | | Atlanta Dirty South rapper Rocko's music career always had been a side note to his romantic relationship with R&B singer Monica until he signed with Def Jam in 2007. |
 | | The self-proclaimed "Ambassador of Rap for the Capital," Wale (pronounced "wah-lay") was able to transcend his local sensation status and become a national rap contender using go-go-inspired hip-hop as the vehicle for his clever wordplay and music. |
 | | Along with fellow Harlem-based player Cam'ron, Jim Jones founded the Diplomat label, home to the Diplomats/Dipset and many of that crew's prolific solo activities. |
 | | Young Money are a rap group affiliated with Lil Wayne and the Cash Money record label who made their commercial debut in 2009 after years of mixtape appearances. |
 | | Miami-based DJ/producer DJ Khaled -- a Palestinian-American born Khaled Khaled -- is a member of Fat Joe's Terror Squad and released Listennn: The Album on Koch in June 2006. |
 | | Born LaRon James in Harlem, the energetic Juelz Santana cut his teeth as an MC with the duo Draft Pick. |
 | | Southern gangsta rappers Pimp C and Bun B formed UGK (aka Underground Kingz) in the late '80s and signed to Jive Records for their major-label debut album, 1992's Too Hard to Swallow. |
 | | Amid the flourishing underground rap scene of Houston, Lil' Flip rose to quick and prosperous fame after his independently released 2000 album The Leprechaun broke through to a national audience, prompting the young rapper's signing to Universal Records soon after. |
 | | The boisterous and brash Trillville began their bid for the title "Gods of Crunk" in 1997 while attending ninth grade in Atlanta's public school system. |
 | | An imposing figure with a voice to match, Slim Thug had been dropping in for guest verses -- on mixtapes and other artists' albums -- for several years before making his full-length debut through the Neptunes' Star Trak label. |
 | | Mixing the party rap sound of his hometown Atlanta with more of an indie attitude, Roscoe Dash came on the scene in 2009 with the club track “All the Way Turnt Up!” Dash was originally called ATL, a moniker he used when he became friendly with the local hip-hop crew Travis Porter. |
 | | To most, rapper Young Buck was a fresh face when he became a member of 50 Cent's crew G-Unit, but he spent a long time waiting on the bench before that. |
 | | Attempting to balance club-friendly, Southern crunk with more conceptual lyrics, Atlanta-based rappers Tity Boi and Dolla Boy first teamed up as Playaz Circle (aka the Duffle Bag Boys) in 1997 in adjacent city College Park, GA. |
 | | Prior to gaining mainstream exposure during late 2004 and early 2005 with his single "Still Tippin'," Houston-based MC and self-promoter extraordinaire Mike Jones had long been a stalwart of the Swishahouse label, with a handful of releases under his belt. |
 | | Busting out of Atlanta in 2011 with his hit street track "Tony Montana," rapper Future grew up in Atlanta's Zone 6 section. |
 | | Formed in 1997, the Hot Boys consisted of four youthful rappers from the same neighborhood of New Orleans, LA. |
 | | Fabolous scored a bit hit, "Can't Deny It," right out of the gate in 2001, instantly establishing himself as a rising East Coast rap star, the song's combination of street-savvy toughness and pop crossover appeal representative of the rapper himself. |
 | | Known as Tity Boi in the Atlanta-based Playaz Circle, rapper 2 Chainz launched his solo career while he was still a member of the crew, in 2007, with the mixtape Me Against the World. |
 | | A game-changing artist and an impervious celebrity, Lil Wayne began as his career as a near-novelty -- a preteen delivering hardcore hip-hop -- but through years of maturation and reinventing the mixtape game, he developed into a million-selling rapper with a massive body of work, one so inventive and cunning that it makes his famous claim of being the "best rapper alive" worth considering. |
 | | Originally formed in 2006 as the Hard Hitters, the trio officially switched to the enigmatic moniker Travis Porter in 2008. |
 | | The Big Tymers, comprised of Cash Money Records co-founder Brian "Baby" Williams and in-house production workhorse Mannie Fresh, were a staple of the label, appearing as featured guests on most of the label's album releases and releasing several albums of their own, including a couple -- I Got That Work (2000) and Hood Rich (2002) -- that were quite successful. |
 | | Rapping since he was just nine years old, Shreveport, LA's Hurricane Chris burst onto the national scene in 2007 with his catchy single "A Bay Bay. |
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