Rap music just vanished from the Billboard Top 40 for the first time in 35 years

Billboard/Yahoo! ^ | Oct 30, 2025 | Aidin Vaziri

[CondoleezzaProtege]

For the first time in more than three decades, not a single rap song ranks among the 40 most popular tracks in America.

Last week's Billboard Hot 100 marked the end of a remarkable 35-year streak, after Kendrick Lamar and SZA's "Luther" - a 13-week No. 1 hit - dropped off the chart. With that departure, the genre that once dominated the nation's listening habits found itself completely absent from the chart's upper tier.

Not since February 1990 has the Billboard Hot 100 gone without a rap entry in its upper ranks.

The gap has been widened by Taylor Swift's "The Life of a Showgirl," which has kept all 12 of its songs in the top 40 for three weeks.

Beyond technicalities, the lull points to a deeper shift. Hip-hop's market share - once nearly 30% in 2020 - has slipped to 24% this year. Two years ago, eight rap songs sat in the top 40, while just five years ago, there were 16.

Meanwhile, pop and country acts have borrowed from hip-hop's rhythms and swagger - sometimes blurring the boundaries so completely that the sound persists even when the artists themselves aren't rappers

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TOPICS: Music/Entertainment
KEYWORDS: billboard; criminalcabal; dindunuffin; dustbinofhistory; gangsta; hiphop; hollywood; music; musicindustry; notmusic; oyvey; rap; whoownstheindustry

[CondoleezzaProtege]

One of the most moving Good Friday experiences I’ve had featured two local rappers rap the entire Gospel account of the Crucifixion in church. The ambience was chill inducing. I remember one of the lyrics now:

“So forever will I tell, In 3 hours Christ suffered more than any sinner ever will in hell.”

It was then I realized why the Devil stole rap. It’s so powerful when channeled rightly.

[xp38]

Somehow I’ll survive this

[yesthatjallen]

Seriously, two day ago I was wonder what happened to rap.

I suspect shows like The Voice, AGT, and American Idol have contributed to the return of singers and songs with melodies.

[bankwalker]

it was never music ...

[fuzzylogic]

Hahahahaha....yeah. Disco was MUCH better.

I’ve always contended - rap is “music”, minus the singing, playing of musical instruments, harmony, and melody.

iow - the lowest common denominator of talent. I get that they’ll tell me “but it’s about lyrics and ‘flows’”, yeah...ok, you can do that and have actual music too.

Let’s get back to real talent....and for anyone paying attention, Taylor Swift’s new album has some very adult lyrics - considering millions of young girls listen to it. More exploitation of our kids.

[bankwalker]

was rap subsidized by USAID?

[dfwgator]

I think the first ‘rap song’ was Johnny Cash’s “A Boy Named Sue”........................

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Hot Rod Lincoln?

[lee martell]

In my opinion one of the first “Rap” songs to be a big hit (even though it was not called Rap back then) would be
“Hot Rod Lincoln”, by Commander Cody & His Lost Planet Airmen, from 1971. The guitar riff draws you in and keeps you there.

The next Rap-rap that was a BIG hit was several years later;
Debbie Harry and Blondie singing “Rapture” from 1980.

[real saxophonist]

A good friend tried out for The Voice, several years ago.

I told him to lay some Johnny Hartman, or something like that, on them.

He didn't listen, and did the veins-popping-out power ballad.

Didn't get past that first audition.

[dfwgator]

Speaking of disco, I was not a big fan of it in it’s heyday, but I must admit this new song is really good. Has a big Chic, Nile Rodgers vibe.

The Favors - Home Sweet Home

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxXlMvRGOOI

[Red Badger]

Rivers, possibly, too.......

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwuHxJrrf0Y

[bankwalker]

Big John?

[CaptainK]

Rap was 100 times worse than disco but was a musical genre cockroach.

[Red Badger]

Walter Brennan had a hit back in 1962 that was called “Old Rivers”...........

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwuHxJrrf0Y

[2nd Amendment]

How can you “spray and pray” when someone disses you if you can’t hear rap music?

[alternatives?]

12 songs from one Taylor Swift album in the top 40? That never happened in the 60’s to 80’s.

[BarbM]

About time! Hopefully that gut rot will disappear for good.
_____________________________
Maybe all the aspiring RAP artists are either in jail or working and too busy to RAP. /s

[CondoleezzaProtege]

12 songs from one Taylor Swift album in the top 40? That never happened in the 60’s to 80’s.

🤣

[DoodleBob]

Ok, I never bought a rap album and maybe I have one rap song in my mp3 collection (if OPP counts-it’s basically the Jackson 5 with PG-13 lyrics).

But the pop, country, and country-fusion nonsense that pushed rap off Billboard’s chart is hardly cause for celebration.

I just listened to a handful of the top 100…awful. The “country” sucks too, though that genre has always been a niche.

Don’t let the Musical-Industrial Complex tell us what’s good and what’s not.

Free. Your. Mind. Go to Bandcamp, an independent music portal where (generally) unsigned bands can post their music for listening, and purchase.

My favorite new discovery is Quintessence by Valley of the Sun

[Henry Hnyellar]

Retards Attempting Poetry