The Pop Corporation

Lists are fun, but we know they’re arbitrary. We all know that, but we still get worked up about them. That’s why publications do them. Hundreds of articles can sail by with barely a whisper of a reply, but as soon as you nail your colours to the mast, everyone’s at your throat and wanting blood.

It’s all mildly ridiculous isn’t it? Just like awards season and everything else besides.

With that, VIBE and Billboard have put their considerable heads together to come up with a list of all the greatest rappers and MCs of all-time and, honestly, it just about looks like you’d expect it to.

Here we go.

• 1. Jay Z
• 2. Kendrick Lamar
• 3. Nas
• 4. Тuрас
• 5. Eminem
• 6. The Notorious B.I.G.
• 7. Lil Wayne
• 8. Drake
• 9. Snoop Dogg
• 10. Nicki Minaj

You can see the full list here. You can carry on reading for further opinion, obviously. And what opinions do we have? Well, our eyes went straight to Nicki Minaj, what with her being the only woman on the list, and therefore in the eyes of this list, the greatest female MC who ever lived. Very successful, that’s true. Does she have some bangers and, when she puts her mind to it, insane bars? Yep. Is she the best to ever do it? Without a truly classic LP, it seems that she should be below Lauryn Hill (‘Miseducation’ being an all-time great, and clearly the most talented member of The Fugees), for our money. Hill sits at 30, remarkably.

Missy Elliott is at 19 seems like an oversight (especially given that J Cole is above her at 15). Rakim at 13 and Andre 3000 at 12 is something we baulked at, as they would be surefire top 3’ers but y’know, personal tastes and all that stuff.

Kanye’s sat at 11, and you have to wonder if his utterly terrible views dropped his position in the GOAT list. Understandable, obviously, but c’mon, that run of albums? Sat below Nicki and Nas? Really? Something adjacent to recency bias at play with that decision, and it might be annoying to give Ye his flowers when he’s been acting such a tit of late, but it’s definitely a thing of note.

Ludacris at 39 seems harsh, given his gigantic influence on hip hop, his wit, his solid gold run of club bangers and appearances and guesties on the charts right across the board – we would have liked to see him much higher because, honestly, Luda doesn’t get nearly enough credit and it’s high time we all collectively did something about that.

Great to see Bun B in there, but no room for Three 6 Mafia MCs? That seems a bit rich given their influence on modern hip hop. Again, another outfit that deserves their flowers more frequently. We briefly got very annoyed there was no appearance for DJ Screw, but then remembered this was about MCs, so we stopped ourselves in our tracks.

And no Young Thug. You sure about a list with no Young Thug on it? That seems like a huge oversight, but y’know, they might have their reasons, right?

And Jay Z number one? Honestly, all things considered it’s difficult to argue against it. He’s pretty much delivered commercially, in the underground, had hits, important and all-encompassing LPs, changed the game and… you know the score… he’s objectively a brilliant artist. Kendrick too – very different to Hov, but well worth a high place on any GOAT chart. We would have place Lil Wayne in the third spot, because c’mon. His influence is still gigantic and hit after hit after hit.

Lists are fun though, if silly things. We’ve already shared the link above and have now run out of things to say.