The Rise of Carti

From Carter to Carti, barely graduating high school to millionaire, underground Soundcloud rapper to tier 1 artist: Playboi Carti, Jordan Terrell Carter, started off as a silhouette in the rap game. Not only getting an early start to music but also his playboy lifestyle, Carter was introduced to music when he joined his church’s choir, mainly to meet the girls in it, as mentioned in an interview by Complex.

Growing up, music continued to play a big part in his life. Carti met the most influential people, those who kickstarted his career while he was in high school. In 2013, Carter was introduced to Ethereal, an iconic producer and founding member of Awful Records, an underground music group and company that rose up to lead the Atlanta trap scene. Carti, quickly becoming friends with the members of Awful, started hanging out with them, traveling with them, and soon started making music with them. This group conjured the birth of “Playboi Carti” as his first Soundcloud song, YUNGXANHOE, featuring Ethereal, was released under his new alias. With his new crew and passion for succeeding in music, Carti stopped going to class to work on his music and hang out with the Awful Records crew. Although paying off in the end, this was very detrimental to his academic life at the time. He missed so many days of school that he wasn’t supposed to graduate. He worked hard to make it so that he could, but on the day of his graduation, no one showed up for him because they didn’t even think he was going to be there.

Carti quickly outgrew the underground, SoundCloud scene of Atlanta, and moved to the Bronx with bigger things in mind. This was the smartest move he could’ve made, as he met the influential A$AP Bari, founder of ASAP MOB and VLONE, and Ian Connor, a stylist and designer who shaped Carti’s sense of fashion and style. Shortly after meeting A$AP Bari, Carter was introduced to arguably the most influential person of all, ASAP Rocky. Rocky and Carti met at a house party in 2015, and immediately became friends, making Carti aware he wanted to roll with the ASAP Mob. This led to Carti collaborating on various projects like Cozy Tapes and numerous singles, and also on diversified fashion projects with VLONE and other brands. Quickly, Playboi Carti signed to Rocky’s AWGE (ASAP Worldwide Global Entertainment) under Interscope Records.

Traveling and performing around with Rocky and the ASAP Mob, Carti continued to expand his network and rise from the depths of Soundcloud. A notable figure he met and collaborated with through Rocky was Lil Uzi Vert. Uzi, being more popular than Carti at the time, was a big aid to Carti in his music career, dropping many hits together like “Ghetto Flowers” “Lookin” and most popularly, “wokeuplikethis*” in 2016 and 2017. Around this time is when a legendary trap duo was born. Playboi Carti and Pierre Bourne took not only the trap scene, but the entire billboard by storm. This was really the transition point in Carter’s career from underground to an a-list celebrity and tier 1 artist. Pierre collaborated with Carti on his debut studio album, Die Lit, which took third on Billboard 200, and stayed on the Billboard for over a year, a feat not many artists have accomplished. The two collaborated on many other popular singles and pieces like “Self Titled,” an extremely successful mixtape for Carti. The two later split, as Pierre wanted to take the solo route and is now flourishing doing so, touring all across the globe.

Aside from the key players which helped shape carti's early career, a major annoyance in his cult-like fanbase, yet what is believed to be a major contributor to his rise to fame is the culture of leaked music in Playboi Carti’s discography. With a long hiatus and many rumored drops between Die Lit and Whole Lotta Red, anticipation for new music was at an all-time high. This anticipation was so great that hackers would find ways to get into Carter’s unreleased music, and even Carti’s friends would leak some of his music. Every new leak broke the internet with his heavenly beats and hyping lyrics. One of his leaks: “Kid Cudi/Pissy Pamper” took the number one spot in Spotify’s US Viral 50 chart before it got taken down from platforms. The leaks kept flowing in, showing up multiple songs at a time on streaming services, all unauthorized and unapproved by Carti himself. This created many delays in the dropping of actual studio music for Carti, just creating more and more anticipation for fans. This ended up proving beneficial, as most people's favorite Christmas present, Whole Lotta Red, Carti’s second studio album, dropped on December 25th, 2020, and quickly took number one on the Billboard 200.

An underlooked yet important factor in Carti’s rise to fame is the impact of archive pages. The additional and underground coverage on Cartis playboy lifestyle was accompanied by a rise in archive instagram culture. Right before the ascendance of TikTok and right after Instagram became more than just a friends and family app archive pages served as an outlet of culture, media, streetwear, fashion and music. These archive pages have built up strong credibility and trust among the public eye with their persistence, dedication, and unique aesthetic they provide to the community. To add to the ethos they’ve built, many of these pages are not only followed by, but have collaborated with many popular celebrities like Takashi Murakami, Lil Yachty, amongst many others. Interestingly, many of these pages took a particular liking towards the niche and underground lifestyle of Playboi Carti’s. Carti’s unique affinity for designer fashion and different outfits caused him to explode. Often times featuring pictures of Carter wearing Supreme, Louis Vuitton, Raf Simons, and his favorite of all, Rick Owens. Through his fashion and unseen aesthetic, archive pages adopted Carti as their own, and grew and changed with him, whether it was through his music or fashion. Because of the popularity and credibility these accounts have established, when they endlessly post images of Playboi Carti’s music and outfits, these loyal, cult-like fans start to admire, appreciate, and envy Playboi Carti and his aesthetic. These archive pages, with their ability to influence social trends, helped the rise of Playboi Carti grow beyond just Soundcloud.

Although on the outside, archive pages, much like our own @unavailable.rsrch, @constellation (and others), may seem like a mood board, photo dump, or collection of thoughts, we believe many archive pages have the ability to influence trends, and thus have played a major role in the growth of frequently featured artists, like Playboi Carti.

It's been incredible to see the transcendence of Carti's career beyond the archive scene and become a major artist and influence on culture. Thank you to @_RyanPellegrini for these exclusive concert photos of Carti on tour in Europe. More to come on Unavailable Media. 👁🛰

Shot by Ryan Pellegrini