#fixation hungry feed it uploading a million pages.

[caracello]

embarking on a journey.

[conorkennedy]

Lil Uzi Vert & Playboi Carti: The Role of Leaked Media, Cult Audiences and Memetic Content to Generate Hype in the Internet Age

In the age of over-saturation of media thanks to the internet, how does someone new stand out? If people like Virgil Abloh and Nigo have shown us anything, hype is what creates the aristocracy of what’s cool. More importantly though, how does one keep hype and attention on oneself or a brand, when the internet tends to fixate on something new every week.

In the wake of the Soundcloud Era of hip hop (2015-2018), only 2 artists have seemed to sustain relevancy. XXXTentacion and Lil Peep have passed, Kodak Black and 6ix9ine are locked up and many others have lost their relevancy within hip hop and pop culture, sans 21 Savage and Denzel Curry. Lil Uzi Vert and Playboi Carti have maintained their significance within popular hip-hop culture. They have not only have sustained their hype but expanded it to general audiences.

This is largely due to the presence of the large cult audiences of both artists. Cult artists keep their hype alive in-between releases, via the creation of internet memes. Memes spread like a virus across the internet and keep artists trending during droughts of publicity. Which is incredible considering both artists are known for keeping a relatively low profile among the press and social media.

Carti and Uzi are able to cultivate these large cult followings through their eccentric personalities. However, their use of ‘snippets’ to tease their audience about the creation or imminent release of new music is not without its effect. These short clips of music, commonly known as ‘snippets’, are the premiere of new and unreleased music on an artists’ Instagram Live livestreams in short clips, usually under a minute or thirty seconds long. This practice would help foster cult audience members as fans would record and share them to other fans via online forums and social media fan pages.

Lil Uzi Vert is infamous for this practice and often accompanies his snippets with his near signature dance sequences, such as the case with ‘Futsal Shuffle 2020’, ‘New Patek’ and ‘Like Me (Myron)’. Which only make his snippets more iconic to fans and causal viewers alike. Some snippets are released or leaked as full songs, such as ‘Futsal Shuffle 2020’ and ‘New Patek’, while others live in infamy as never seeing the light of day, like ‘Lotus’. And if years pass with no release or mention of the snippet, fans can only hope for a leak of the full song, such as the case with Kanye West and Jay Z’s ‘Living So Italian’, driving demand for leaked music to skyrocket to please fans.

The memetic content of both Lil Uzi Vert and Playboi Carti is largely fuelled by each artists’ aura of mystique surrounding them and their sophomore studio albums “Eternal Atake” and “Whole Lotta Red”. The fanatic obsession with these albums then inflames the infatuation of fans with leaked material from their favourite artists. On prominent websites where leaked material is collected and shared, like [REDACTED], Uzi and Carti are amongst the most prolific with hundreds of songs leaked on the websites. These leaked songs then spread to more mainstream websites like Youtube and Soundcloud, where a greater amount of fans can find and listen to them. This has led to awkward moments at live shows. Where Carti or Uzi will perform unreleased material to a crowd that will sing along to every lyric.

These leaks can then transcend cult fanbases of both artists through the creation of memes, both about and surrounding leaked music. This is best exemplified in the popularity of Playboi Carti and Yung Nudy’s “Pissy Pamper/Kid Cudi”. Which became one of the most popular songs of 2019, without a release, thanks to the backing of meme accounts on Twitter and Instagram. These accounts would use the song as a backing track to a variety of comedic psychedelic imagery. The song would also be continuously propelled to the forefront of Spotify’s “Viral Charts” despite never being officially released. The song would be randomly uploaded by random users and fans, gain popularity and reach the viral chart, where it would then be removed by Spotify. “Kid Cudi” would push Carti into mainstream pop culture. As the song, memes about the song, his sophomore album “Whole Lotta Red”, as well as hype for the album in general would gain Carti more exposure to a greater audience and attention in the press. Despite his only official release being a 40 second feature on Tyler, the Creator’s “IGOR”.

The same would happen with Lil Uzi Vert, although without a hit leaked song. Hype for both of these artists have sustained, even without major releases or the press coverage that comes with them. Although unintended for Uzi, Carti has used this strategy for each of his releases. Initially gaining hype in the underground in around 2014 for the “Red” Tape and later in 2015 would officially release the song “Broke Boi”. Playboi Carti would have his fans begging for his debut mixtape and his fans scratching their heads, wondering how he hadn’t lost momentum amongst a sea of new and exciting talent. This hype would build until 2017 when Carti would drop his self-titled debut tape, with smash hits like “Magnolia” and “wokeuplikethis*”, as well as fan favourites like “Flex” and “Location”, to critical acclaim.

Marketing strategies such as these are not entirely new. Back in 2008, before the release of “Tha Carter 3″, Lil Wayne would release “The Leak”, a compilation of leaked music that was recorded during the C3 sessions to build buzz for the project. This strategy would prove successful as Tha Carter 3 would sell over one million copies in its first week of release. The last hip hop album to do so until Drake’s “Views” in 2016.

Within the age of media over-saturation, thanks to the internet, the power to grab people’s attention for a long period of time, leaked media, help to feed a hungry core fanbase is unmatched in generating hype for a project or artist.