Despite his evasion of stylistic pigeonholing and no label affiliation -- not even a major-bankrolled vanity imprint -- Chance the Rapper became one of the most significant artists to infiltrate the mainstream during the 2010s. Through several mixtapes, his output underwent a rapid evolution as he celebrated life and faith, mourned personal loss, and hit upon lighter everyday experiences with high-aptitude wordplay served with a variety of mostly genial styles.

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 third album The Beautiful & Damned, which paired him with Halsey on the platinum "Him & I," and A$AP Rocky and Cardi B on the Top Four hit "No Limit."

Canadian rapper/producer Night Lovell embraced a dark and mysterious style from the start, working with tense beats and haunting vocal samples. His lyrics skewed toward darkness and pain on much of his work, resulting in a viral hit with his first single and huge fanfare for his brooding full-length releases like 2016's Red Teenage Melody. Night Lovell was born Shermar Paul in Ottawa, Ontario in 1997.