We wrap up our 2014 lists with the finale of Artists. The top artists in 2014 is determined this time by the album sales, buzz, impact on social media and if they were all other the place. This one isn’t based off our opinions, even though we input some. It’s mainly based off the facts, now hit the jump and see who’s on our list.
Previous: Top 10 Songs of 2014 | Top 10 Mixtapes of 2014 | Top 10 Albums of 2014
10. YG – YG has had an intense year. After building up buzz in 2013 and transferring it into 2014 with his debut album ‘My Krazy Life’ he had the beginning year in Hip-Hop on lock. That enough solidified his spot on the list. On top of that he appeared on quite a few hits such as Jeremih’s ‘Don’t Tell Em’ record. He kept it real low key after dropping his debut album and appeared at a few events here and there but it was mainly about the music with him and we respect it. We don’t know if we will get anything from YG in 2015 but we sure do know he will be in that lab working on something regardless.
9. Schoolboy Q – The TDE member Q had a lot of pressure on his back. After Kendrick Lamar delivered such an amazing debut album it was all on him to continue the tradition to deliver TDE top quality content. With his debut album ‘Oxymoron’ released in February he did just that and spawned a few hits like ‘Man of the Year’ and ‘Studio’. Even though Schoolboy Q laughed off the pressure he knows he had to deliver and handled it well. Q then went on tour and basically disappeared just like YG which I respect once again because it was clearly just about the music for these two in 2014. Q might be having something going on in 2015 with TDE, you never know.
8. Young Thug – I don’t know where to begin with this creature. Let’s start off with what’s most important, the music. Young Thug in 2014 was basically everywhere and every single thing he was featured on or he released caught on heat. He was dominating the blogs with constant content that was popular. Just on DHH alone he kept getting the top slot every time he released something. The record ‘Lifestyle’ alone catapulted him into a different level not to mention the tracks he was featured on like T.I.’s ‘About The Money’. On top of the music he was constantly in the news with the gay rumors of him wearing a dress, calling his friends “bae” and “boo”, wearing finger nail polish and a bunch of bizarre stuff (not saying that being a gay man is bizarre). Young Thug later said that he is as straight as the division line. All of this is just a way to keep people talking about him and it worked, let’s see what he comes up with in 2015.
7. Rick Ross – In 2014 Rozay was taking no hostages. Musically he released two solo albums in one year and both of them didn’t do as well as his previous albums but were still recognized well within the Hip-Hop community. Not many artists release two albums in one year, only a few you can name such as DMX. Although his singles didn’t really chart he did deliver somewhat quality music. Having to deal with the issues of Wale and Meek Mill fighting Rozay didn’t stop. But, this isn’t the reason why he landed so high on the list. It’s all cause of that Vine clip of him doing an interview with Tim Westwood where he says “Shout out to all the pear”. Yes, that line the internet was fascinated with and ran with it. All of a sudden meme’s were being made, in interviews Rozay was shouting out pears, cartoons were being made and attention was given to Rozay’s shout out more than the music. You couldn’t get away from a pear joke in 2014 all thanks to Ross. Let’s see if he shout outs anything in 2015 that will catch wind.
6. Chris Brown – Breezy was all about the music and cleaning himself up in 2014. Despite having to do jail time during the Summer he still managed to have the hottest record of the Summer with ‘Loyal’ and then delivered a very solid album ‘X’ right after being released. It was good to see that Chris Brown was focused more on the music in 2014 and less with the drama. The fact that he pulled off a successful music year despite of the things he was going through shows a lot about him. Even got him a few Grammy nominations. In 2015 he’s already kicking things out with a collab album with Tyga and already another hit with ‘Ayo’.
5. Kevin Gates – A lot of people weren’t familiar with Kevin Gates in the beginning of 2014, but boy did Kevin Gates find a way to make his mark in the mainstream world. After releasing his mixtape ‘By Any Means’ which was arguably one of the best mixtapes released that year he decided to generate some random buzz all caused by DJ Whoo Kid. While at his show DJ Whoo Kid asked Kevin Gates if he eats booty from a female and he said yes and when he said that it blew up all over the internet. Apparently not many guys are willing to admit that they eat a female’s booty but Kevin Gates sure did and it wasn’t a bad thing for him as it increased his Instagram followers by a whopping 900k which then caused a ripple affect and got his music charting well on iTunes even though the projects were released for free (mainstream America isn’t aware of that though). Knowing he had something Kevin Gates decided to spice it up more and revealed on Instagram that he had been having sex with his cousin for years. That, of course, also blew up and gained him more followers and even landed him on TMZ. We don’t know the weird tactics Kevin Gates is coming up with but, it’s working. His latest project ‘Luca Brasi 2′ ended up selling well on iTunes even though you can purchase it for free as well. Kevin Gates on the other hand in interviews portrays himself as a really smart individual, just wish he did it more on his Instagram. But like he said in one song “Instagram is just for entertainment purposes” and the world has been entertained. Let’s see what other weird antics Kevin comes up with in 2015.
4. 50 Cent – Curtis sure knows how to stay in the limelight regardless of not having a mainstream hit in awhile. To kick things off he had everyone talking in the beginning of 2014 by simply leaving his longtime label that launched his career Interscope Records and taking the independent route. A lot of people were questioning what he was capable of independently. With the hype building up he announced the release his first independent album ‘Animal Ambition’ and everyone was waiting. He managed to only sell around 45,000 copies the first week but due to his marketing strategy and being independent he banked $3 Million off the album, getting him paid more than an artist who’s sold over 500,000 copies. Other than the music 50 managed to stay in the headlines. From confronting Steve Stoute at the New York Knicks game to pitching the worst pitch at the Mets arena to making fun of Floyd Mayweather’s reading abilities and having the whole internet make fun of Floyd as well to getting Slow of Slowbucks robbed of his chain at the Summer Jam concert in front of 70,000 people to reuniting G-Unit to releasing a #1 show on Starz ‘POWER’ to inking a deal for $78 Million for underwear, 50 never stops and always somehow manages to stay in the headlines. For that, he’s easily in the Top 5 in 2014. Let’s see what 50’s got cooking for 2015.
3. Bobby Shmurda – Who would’ve thought a 7 second clip from Vine would create a career out of a rapper from New York who used an old Lloyd Banks beat to rap about catching bodies and getting hoes out of his trap house. With his track ‘Hot N*gga’ easily becoming the hottest record in Hip-Hop for 2014 he catapulted into stardom. From the streets to mainstream America the whole world was doing the Bobby Shmurda dance and the whole world was saying “caught a body about a week ago” not knowing that Bobby’s friend Mitch really did catch a body (kill someone) a week ago. With everything going right for Bobby, the feds decided to arrest him as they had enough proof to get him locked up for years. In late 2014 Bobby and his team all got locked up in the largest drug/gun case I’ve ever seen from any rapper. It looks like all the stuff Bobby said in his track ‘Hot N*gga’ was actually going on. Now he’s locked up and no word as to if he’s going to get out anytime soon. Don’t know what 2015 will hold for Bobby but he had the biggest record in 2014 so I guess that’s one positive.
2. Drake – Despite not releasing an album in 2014 Drake still managed to stay relevant and as hot as when he did release an album. He dropped a few songs for 2014 and one of them being ‘0 to 100′ which got him a Grammy nomination and well made the whole world say ‘0 to 100′ in every scenario. Just the fact that he got nominated for a free track itself should say something. On top of that he got into a lot of controversy, actually for that ‘o to 100′ track. Diddy supposedly owned the beat before Drake and the producer Boi-1da let Drake get the beat as well since Diddy wasn’t using it and well Drake made a hit out of it and Diddy didn’t like that one bit and punched him at a party event and temporarily dislocated Drake’s shoulder’. Well that wasn’t all that Drake was involved in, he also got into a beef with Tyga over a female. It seems like Drake has an issue with women constantly as strippers have accused him of setting up assassination hits on them and all kinds of insane stuff. All this stuff as far as Drake is concerned creates for better music and that’s why in 2015 I’m excited in hearing his new album ‘Views From The 6′ and seeing what he delivers.
1. J. Cole – Cole was real lowkey in 2014 and nobody really expected anything from him in 2014 simply because he did amazing in 2013 and usually if history repeats itself he would take a 1 year hiatus from music to create something else as all of us thought. The first time we ever saw Cole in the public was when the Ferguson issue came about, Cole actually stopped by Ferguson to show support for the families and the community suffering from Mike Brown’s death. With his hair and beard grown out we knew he was cooking up some sort of music in the studio but had no clue it would be released in 2014 and that made it all that more special. Towards the end of 2014 J Cole randomly announced that his album ‘2014 Forest Hills Drive’ is releasing in December and instead of doing the traditional thing and going to radio stations and doing interviews he decided to go tour and stop by fans houses who were lucky enough to get a tweet from him and if he happened to be in your location. We got to witness in real time J. Cole tweeting a fan and visiting them allowing them to meet their favorite artist in person and to listen to the new album before anyone else. J. Cole even got Chipotle for a fan that asked, which is insane and humbling. Then his performance on David Letterman had everyone in tears (including me) because of how impactful it was. He was speaking on the black community becoming slaved again and how much most of the black community suffers and managed to capture all the pain in 2014 from everyone in that one moment. Not to mention J. Cole sold a crazy amount of albums for no single’s released and just a random release he did very well. The only interview he did was on Angie Martinez and he didn’t even go there to promote the album he talked about all the problems in the world which made me connect with him more because I thought the same exact way and I’m glad someone in power speaks for us. Because of all of this and the impact he had off a random album release he deserves the number one spot. For keeping it authentic with the world. We don’t know what to expect from J. Cole in 2015 but we hope it goes a little something like what he did in the end of 2014.
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