Hip Hop
Hip hop is a genre built on rapping over rhythmic beats, born at block parties in the Bronx, New York, in the 1970s.
DJs such as Kool Herc and Grandmaster Flash looped the drum breaks of funk and soul records while MCs rhymed over them. The music now relies on sampling, drum machines, heavy bass and spoken, rhyming vocals. Hip hop also names the wider culture around it, which includes DJing, breakdancing and graffiti, and it has grown regional styles all over the world.
Artists it is known for: Run-DMC, Nas, OutKast, Kendrick Lamar.
- Family
- Hip-Hop & Rap
- On Spotify
- A current genre
- What it is
- A broad heading
- From
- The Bronx, New York, 1970s
- Also called
- hip-hop, rap
- Trackify listeners who play it
- 52%
About 43,000 of 83,000 Trackify listeners with public profiles have hip hop among their top artists of the last four weeks. Rounded; updated 13 November 2026.
Hip Hop artists
Drake
Kendrick Lamar
Frank Ocean
Tyler, The Creator
A$AP Rocky
Playboi Carti
J. Cole
Mac Miller
Brent Faiyaz
Eminem
The hip hop artists most Trackify listeners have in their top fifty. Each opens on Spotify.
Sources
The definition is written for this site from open sources, and was checked against them on 13 November 2026.