Wolf + Rothstein to a worldwide publishing
administration deal in May 2018, Gambino’s “This
Is America” debuted at No. 1 on the Hot 100 on
the way to generating 648 million U.S. streams
and winning four Grammys. Kendrick Lamar and
SZA’s Black Panther soundtrack cut “All the Stars”
(helmed by Taylor’s writer-producer clients Al Shux
and Sounwave) was also nominated for an Acade-
my Award, a Golden Globe and four Grammys.
OWNING IT New priorities include rappers Roddy
Ricch, who made his Hot 100 debut as a lead act
with “Die Young” in May, and Gunna, whose debut
album, Drip or Drown 2, entered the Billboard 200
at No. 3 in March. Both signed global deals with
Kobalt in the summer. “These kids know not to give
up their publishing for a big check,” says Taylor, 42,
who rose to Kobalt’s executive suite in July. “At Ko-
balt, they’re able to stay the owners of their work.”
DIGITAL/STREAMING
Tuma Basa
DIRECTOR OF URBAN MUSIC, YOUTUBE
ALL THE WORLD IS HIS STAGE The former curator of
Spotify’s influential RapCaviar playlist worked with
global head of artist relations Vivien Lewit to estab-
lish YouTube Music’s recent partnership with African
music talent incubator emPawa Africa. “We’re true
importers of global music,” says Basa about his em-
ployer. “If you upload a video from Africa, anyone
in the world — whether in Omaha, Neb., or Kiev,
Ukraine — can fuck with it.”
HIP-HOP HYPE MAN In June, Basa marked his first year
at YouTube, where his role as a hip-hop culture am-
bassador has taken him to events like the 2019 Africa
Business Conference at Harvard Business School.
Carl Chery
HEAD OF URBAN, SPOTIFY
Mjeema Pickett
GLOBAL HEAD, R&B/SOUL, SPOTIFY
EXHIBITING GREATNESS Chery joined Spotify in May
2018 from Apple Music, where he served as head
of curation. His first order of business? Refreshing
RapCaviar’s Pantheon exhibit, which immortalizes
rap stars with Greco-Roman style sculptures at the
Brooklyn Museum. The attraction certainly hasn’t
hurt RapCaviar’s numbers: The playlist boasts 12 mil-
lion followers, up 4 million since Pantheon opened
in 2017. Pickett celebrated the platform’s Are & Be
playlist surpassing 5 million followers with a jam
session at New Orleans’ Essence Festival in July.
“There was so much love in the room,” she says.
HIM AND H.E.R. At the 2019 Grammys, H.E.R. won
best R&B album for her self-titled LP — and gave
Chery an unexpected shout-out. “My phone started
blowing up,” he recalls.
Tim Hinshaw
HEAD OF HIP-HOP AND R&B, AMAZON MUSIC
Rochelle Balogun
MUSIC CURATOR, HIP-HOP AND R&B, AMAZON MUSIC
AMAZON GUIDES Working in tandem, Hinshaw,
29, and Balogun, 36, led the launch of the global
playlists Rap Rotation and R&B Rotation, which both
debuted in the top 10 of Amazon Music’s charts.
PRIME PLACEMENT Hinshaw, who has been with
the company for just over a year, says he’s “hyper
focused” on “making sure R&B/hip-hop is repre-
sented in everything we do and becoming a leader
in that space.” In addition to launching the Rotation
brand (it’s streamed in over 200 countries), in 2018,
native Los Angeleno Balogun launched the Hype
Music playlist, which she says was directly inspired
by customers asking Alexa to “play hype music.”
Larry Jackson
HEAD OF CONTENT, APPLE MUSIC
Ebro Darden
GLOBAL EDITORIAL HEAD OF HIP-HOP AND R&B, APPLE
MUSIC; HOST, BEATS 1
SCRATCHIN’ AT STEVE’S In April, Apple Music re-
portedly surpassed Spotify in paid U.S. subscribers
with over 28 million. It was one of many firsts that
Darden has experienced in the 10 months since
he took on his current role — he first joined Apple
Music as a Beats 1 host in 2015 — but he says he’s
most proud of a different milestone: booking the
first rapper and DJ to perform at Apple Park’s Steve
Jobs Theater as part of the company’s Black Music
Month celebration. He says, “I don’t think people
had ever danced in the theater before that.”
BEATS WITHOUT BORDERS Growing up, Jackson
wanted to be a meteorologist. Now, instead of
predicting weather patterns, he and Darden are
forecasting industry trends. Jackson says Apple
Music always has explored “uncharted territory”
such as his idea to pair 2 Chainz and LeBron James
for Rap or Go to the League. The NBA superstar
executive-produced the rapper’s LP.
MEDIA
Charlamagne Tha God
AUTHOR; RADIO/TV PERSONALITY; HOST, THE BREAKFAST
CLUB, WWPR (POWER 105.1) NEW YORK
HELP LINE In the year since the hip-hop personal-
ity released his second book, Shook One: Anxiety
Playing Tricks on Me, Charlamagne has become
a crucial voice for mental health advocacy in the
urban community: “I was just telling my story, but
I’ve seen it help so many other people.”
RATCHET MEETS RIGHTEOUS This year, as the
highest-profile co-host of WWPR’s The Breakfast
Club — the No. 1 syndicated hip-hop morning
show that airs on 80-plus stations and has logged
over 1.5 billion YouTube views — the blunt father
of three daughters has rankled Nicki Minaj and
alienated Logic, while also going emotionally deep
with Offset. But the show’s unexpected role as a
2020 presidential campaign stop for Sens. Kamala
Harris and Bernie Sanders, as well as South Bend,
Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, makes Charlamagne
especially proud. “We give people the medicine as
well as the candy,” says the South Carolinian. “It’s a
perfect balance of ratchetness and righteousness.”
Connie Orlando
EXECUTIVE VP/HEAD OF PROGRAMMING, BET; EXECUTIVE
PRODUCER, 2019 BET AWARDS
HORSE POWER In June, the 2019 BET Awards aired
the live-TV performance debut of Lil Nas X’s “Old
Town Road,” complete with featured remix guest
Billy Ray Cyrus, two horses and a replica saloon.
It was simulcast across eight Viacom networks,
including MTV, TV Land and VH1.
HURRICANE CONNIE The annual ceremony drew
12.7 million total viewers, up a staggering 290%
from 4.3 million in 2018. Says Orlando, who marked
her second year as the network’s top programmer
in September: “It was the perfect storm.”
Kashon Powell
VP PROGRAMMING, RADIO ONE
RAISING RATINGS Powell got a research assistant gig
at KBXX-FM (97.9) to avoid University of Houston’s
campus housing. (“I wanted an apartment,” she says
with a laugh.) Radio One acquired the station in
2000, and the Washington, D.C.-based bookworm
rose to oversee programming for the company’s
D.C., Baltimore and Philadelphia markets. In
February, Powell became the first woman to hold a
vp of programming post at the company, and under
her guidance, WMMJ Washington, D.C.’s average
Nielsen rating for the 6-plus demographic rose
from 7.0 in August 2018 to 8.2 in August 2019.
HUSTLE AND FLOW Powell launched The Morning
Hustle and Love and R&B With Al B. Sure! in 2019.
“It comes down to providing your audience with the
voices you know they want to hear,” she says.
BEST R&B/HIP-HOP COLLABORATIONS
BASA
CHERY
PICKETT
HINSHAW
BALOGUN
JACKSON
DARDEN
CHARLAMAGNE
ORLANDO
POWELL
“YEAH!” — USHER FEATURING LIL JON AND LUDACRIS
“It was one of the few times I heard several popular
rap and R&B artists come together to make a song and
effectively showcase their individual skill sets.”
—AL “BUTTER” McLEAN, KOBALT MUSIC
From left:
Ludacris, Usher
and Lil Jon
66 BILLBOARD • OCTOBER 19, 2019
&
POWER PLAYERS 2019