HIP-HOP AT 50: SPOTIFY'S CARL CHERY
GETS EDITORIAL ON YOUR ASS

Carl Chery was in a bit of a quandary. It was the spring of 2018 and the Queens native had just been hired at Spotify as creative director and head of urban music. A key priority was expanding the reach of the streaming powerhouse’s most influential playlist, "RapCaviar." Since its 2015 rollout, the weekly 50-song ranking has featured some of the buzziest hip-hop tracks in the country, catapulting up-and-coming and even unknown artists to stardom.

Chery was well aware of the enormous role "RapCaviar" had played in boosting the careers of headliners like Lil Uzi Vert, Cardi B and 21 Savage. He wanted to take the journalistic foundation he’d built during stints at The Source and XXL and implement a more curated, editorial approach to Spotify’s crown jewel. There was, however, one fundamental roadblock.

“The difference between 'RapCaviar' and traditional platforms is that we had no context,” Chery illuminates. “RapCaviar is a collection of 50 songs that gets updated on a weekly basis, but we’re not able to contextualize our choices―to explain why this song is at #1 as opposed to #10, or say which emerging artists you’re discovering from the playlist. That’s when we started planting the seeds and having more conversation with the community.”

Chery and his team have done more than just plant seeds; they’ve transformed "RapCaviar," with its 14 million-strong subscriber base, into a branding multiverse.

In 2019 RapCaviar Live produced a groundbreaking all-female hip-hop concert in Miami that featured, among others, future superstars Latto, Megan Thee Stallion and Doja Cat as well as legendary veteran Lil Kim.

The RapCaviar Podcast, launched in 2022, hosts some of the most spirited, irreverent discussions in hip-hop.

This year, the acclaimed RapCaviar Presents docuseries, featuring in-depth interviews with the likes of Tyler, The Creator, Cardi B, Megan Thee Stallion, Coi Leray, Polo G, Jack Harlow and City Girls, debuted on Hulu.

Add to all this the tastemaking playlist’s presence on social-media hubs like Instagram (1.3 million followers) and Twitter (329k+ followers), where "RapCaviar" routinely ignites viral debates.

“They’re collectively a storytelling vehicle,” Chery says of the flagship’s myriad spinoffs. “Now we have an ability to not only contextualize 'RapCaviar' but our larger point of view on hip-hop.”

We spoke to Chery about, among other burning issues, the Hip-Hop Mount Rushmore of the 2010s, the influence of City Girls and how RapCaviar has become indispensable to the culture.

Given that it was already a successful brand, what did you envision for RapCaviar when you started at Spotify?

Pretty much what you’re seeing now. Obviously, I have to give a lot of credit to Spotify and an incredible playlist like "RapCaviar." It established itself as both an authority in hip-hop and something aspirational for this generation. So when I joined the company, I was just, like, “OK, don’t break anything.” But I also wanted to look at what’s been done in the past and see where there were opportunities for change.

What changes did you have in mind?

If you look at artists who’ve thrived on the playlist over the years, there’s been a lot of trap. There weren’t as many artists who’d be considered more alternative like, say, Tyler, The Creator. With that in mind, I had to get familiar with the playlist and figure out what worked and what didn’t. The big picture was 100% building up the RapCaviar universe.

You mentioned Tyler, who led RapCaviar Presents. What was the pitching process like for such an ambitious series?

The first time I thought about a docuseries was literally a few months after I started. The idea was pretty simple. I’ve always looked to credible sources from the past. Even before I joined Spotify, I’d read articles that compared RapCaviar to [influential New York radio station] Hot 97 in its heyday. I always compared RapCaviar to Hot 97 or New York’s Power 106, The Source, XXL, Yo! MTV Raps, BET’s Rap City and some of the more popular blogs.

I realized it was important to build channels that served not only as an extension of the RapCaviar voice but the voice of hip-hop as a whole at Spotify. Because RapCaviar has evolved into being not just a playlist; it’s also our mouthpiece for hip-hop.

Beefing up our social media was an important step, too. We hired an agency to help us work on our Instagram and Twitter presence to again, add some context to what we’re doing.

Last year Spotify launched The RapCaviar Podcast. With so many hip-hop podcasts out there, how did you go about separating yourselves from the pack?

Because we’re in the clickbait era, a lot of those podcasts thrive on controversy. So my thing was to just focus on the music and the culture. It’s not a groundbreaking concept, but at the same time, who’s doing that? You heard it on the first episode of the podcast, where the conversation was “Who’s the next Big 3?” We went viral when we did the Hip-Hop Mount Rushmore of the 2010s.

To put it mildly. There were some passionate arguments over those picks.

So The Big 3 isn’t Kendrick, Drake and Cole? Is that what we’re saying?

I actually wrote a piece for this very issue on why Drake, Future and Kendrick are The Big 3 of the 2010s. What say you, Carl Chery?

I think Future definitely has his merits. But the overall conversation has mostly been Drake, Kendrick and Cole. The other two in the discussion are Future and Nicki.

That starting five is not debatable.

Right―if we’re talking about hip-hop artists who were bred that decade. Because if you open it up, you have to consider Kanye and you have to consider Wayne because they’ve had a massive impact.

There’s a plethora of hip-hop artists featured on RapCaviar Presents. What inspired you to go with Tyler, The Creator, City Girls and Megan Thee Stallion?

I met Tyler years ago when I was at XXL, but for all intents and purposes our first real interaction was in 2021 when we had a Spotify meeting to hear new music from CALL ME IF YOU GET LOST. You know Tyler―he doesn’t bite his tongue. He spoke about feeling not supported by "RapCaviar" in the past, but it turned out to be a great conversation.

How so?

We were probably in there for two hours just talking. One of the things he asked me was why "RapCaviar" doesn’t sprinkle in songs from older artists every now and then. He felt it was important that the new generation have a tool to discover some of the artists that paved the way. Now, as I said before, I compare "RapCaviar" to mediums of the past, but at first it was hard for me to envision its place next to those because it was “just” a playlist. So how do you do what Tyler’s talking about?

Then one day I thought of trying something new: a Throwback Thursday segment. Instead of it being a 50th song on the playlist, it’s the 53rd, a bonus song, to see if we can shine a light on some of these artists that defined other generations. So if you look at "RapCaviar" right now, you’re going to see an older song at a later slot. That idea came in part from that conversation with Tyler.

So when you went with Tyler as the first interview on RapCaviar Presents, was that by design?

I have to give credit to Karam Gill, the director of the episode. We had dinner and we started talking about ideas and Karam says, “What do you think about doing the first episode on Tyler?” And right away I remembered the conversation Tyler and I’d had. Another thing he was saying was how it’s important that kids can be weird like him but still end up driving cars that cost half a million. That always stuck with me. He has a lot to say.

In terms of Megan and City Girls, I’m a big fan. We had Meg as early as 2020, when we shot the pilot. Remember, that was the year after we did the all-female concert in Miami. So when we were pitching stories, I was, like, “Yo, we gotta talk about this movement that’s happening right now with women in hip-hop.”

And women hip-hop artists are still killing it.

Yeah! But at that moment it just felt like we’d never seen so many female rappers at the same time. With City Girls, when it was time to shoot the first season, I’m obviously excited to hear new music from them because they haven’t put out music in a while. But I really wanted to touch on their cultural impact. Because their influence right now is up there with any artist of their generation.

You really see it on social media. Yung Miami and JT have amassed an army of acolytes with everything from their slang and relationship philosophies to their fashion sense.

And I wanted to know how they started thinking the way they do. And that’s reflected in the series. I remember when we were writing the narration with [director] Wendy Lee and Clover Hope, who’s an incredible writer; we were trying to find the right words to explain their impact, because City Girls were literally affecting the way people date. I don’t think they’ve gotten their due for being hip-hop visionaries. They’re actually discredited sometimes because of the subject matter they talk about.

You went to Brooklyn College and earned a degree in journalism, which is a rarity in hip-hop journalism these days. Did you always know you were going to cover the music and culture that had such a profound impact on you growing up?

My family is from Haiti, so as a kid of immigrants, I always joke that most of my family, including me, have had traditional jobs like teacher, nurse and accountant. My grandfather was a lawyer. And I come from a big family with a lot of older cousins where hip-hop was always front and center. So the decision to go into music journalism was very simple for me. Plus, I grew up reading The Source and XXL. But I’m reading these magazines every month and growing frustrated with some of the editorial decisions they’re making. So I had a simple thought: Instead of complaining about what they’re doing, find a way to get your voice out there.

Can you say something about how Spotify is commemorating the 50th anniversary of hip-hop?

I can’t reveal specifics because some of it’s still in the works. The one thing I can share is that we want to acknowledge the anniversary in more than one way. One of the ways we’re going to acknowledge it is by having some conversations on social media―hip-hop’s history and Spotify’s history and going to intersect. I think some artists especially will be very excited by the stuff we plan on putting out there.