Lil B

Brandon “Lil B” McCartney (born August 17, 1989 and also known as The BasedGod, Lil Boss, Based Lord, Captain 66, Based Legend, The #1 Bitch, Tiny Pants Mobsta, Masterchef and Pretty Bitch) is a rapper/author/producer/composer/director/soothsayer from Berkeley, CA. He has been rapping since age 16 with hip hop group The Pack and leading a successful solo career, garnering popularity through the use of social media websites. He created many MySpace pages in order to upload all of his music and recorded over 1,500 tracks as of July 2010. He signed with Amalgam Digital in 2010 for a multiple album deal.

He released his first studio album, Angels Exodus, on January 18, 2011 through the digital label. The album serves as a prelude to his forthcoming album Glass Face. When Lil B titled his last digital label released album I’m Gay, he received several death threats. Although he is heterosexual, he says the title is a message of support to the LGBT community.

Referring to the alternative definition of gay, he says he is gay because he is happy. Following the death threats, he added “I’m Happy” in parenthesis to the album’s title. I’m Gay received positive reviews with many fans commenting on the album’s wide variety of positive messages and noting the unique beats and lyrical styles not common to mainstream hip hop. He raps about many controversial issues including race relations, poverty, humanity, and the justice system.

The album also, according to many fans, shows the “true” side of Lil B. It entered the Billboard R&B/Hip Hop Albums chart at #56 and the Heatseekers Albums chart at #20 for the week of July 16, 2011. It is for sale on iTunes but Lil B also uploaded it to the Internet for free, posting a link to it on Twitter and Facebook saying, “for all my fans who don’t have $10 to buy my album, here it is for free.” Lil B typically releases at least one mixtape every month; so far in 2012 he has released 13 mixtapes - 4 in July alone. One of those released in July was the massive 848-song, nearly 5GB collection of Based Freestyles, which is his largest release to date.

In 2013, hip-hop listeners voted Lil B as the greatest rapper of all time.