Year-End List Idea: The Top 50 Celebrations of "50 Years of Hip-Hop" of the Year.

Interesting that as we celebrate 50 years of hip-hop, an entire year has gone by without a rap song reaching number one on the Billboard Hot 100.

The last time the Hot 100 went without a rap champ for at least a year was after Will Smith's "Wild Wild West" reigned in July 1999. Following the soundtrack single's one-week rule, rap was absent from the Hot 100 summit until Shaggy's "It Wasn't Me" began a two-week command in February 2001. [source]

"The Real Slim Shady" didn't hit number one?!

2023 is also the longest we've gone into a calendar year without a rap album at number one on the Billboard 200 since 1993.

Cypress Hill's Black Sunday hit number one the week of August 7, 1993. Travis Scott's Utopia hit number one the week of August 12, 2023.