G-Eazy

With his slicked-back hair and leather jacket, G-Eazy was known as "the James Dean of rap" when he debuted in the late 2000s. Armed with bars that detailed hedonistic excess and conflicted inner turmoil, he steadily climbed the charts in the 2010s on the strength of his hit duet with Bebe Rexha, "Me, Myself & I," from his major-label debut, 2014's These Things Happen. He repeated that success in 2017 with his third album, The Beautiful & Damned, which paired him with Halsey on the platinum "Him & I," and guests A$AP Rocky and Cardi B on the Top Four hit "No Limit." Without losing any of his swagger, G-Eazy has matured, even singing and exploring a more introspective sound, as on the 2020 side project Everything's Strange Here and the 2021 full-length These Things Happen Too. Following a hiatus, the single "Femme Fatale," heralded the rapper's seventh album, 2024's Freak Show. Born Gerald Earl Gillum in Oakland, California, G-Eazy launched his career while still in college at Loyola University in New Orleans, heading up a hip-hop crew named the Bay Boyz while releasing his solo debut, The Epidemic LP, in 2009. Two years later, his mixtape The Endless Summer landed with the hit redo of Dion's "Runaround Sue." In 2012 he released his second LP, Must Be Nice, hitting the road with Hoodie Allen and joining the Vans Warped Tour. In 2014 he returned with his first major-label release, These Things Happen (RCA). As his popularity grew in the following year, he embarked on an extensive international tour and recorded his fourth album. When It's Dark Out was released in late 2015 and included a hit duet with Bebe Rexha, "Me, Myself & I." Dark would go on to peak at number five on the Billboard 200 and top the R&B/Hip-Hop chart. In the summer of 2016, while on tour with Logic, YG, and Yo Gotti, Eazy appeared on Britney Spears' comeback single "Make Me," which entered the Top 20 of the Hot 100. "Some Kind of Drug," his single featuring Marc E. Bassy, arrived at the end of the year and would enter the singles charts in e