With an earning of $37 million in the past 12 months, Hov takes his fourth Cash Kings crown in five years.
Hip-hop’s reigning Cash King continues to reap the benefits of a 10-year $150 million Live Nation deal, as well as stakes in the New Jersey Nets, the 40/40 Club chain, ad firm Translation and others. This year marked the first time he out-earned wife Beyonce since their marriage in 2008.
Jay-Z – $37M
Diddy – $35M
Kanye West – $16M
Lil Wayne – $15M (tie)
Birdshit – $15M (tie)
Eminem – $14M (tie)
Snoop Dogg $14M (tie)
Dr. Dre $14M (tie)
Akon – $13M
Ludacris – $12M
Wiz Khalifa – $11M (tie)
Drake – $11M (tie)
Pharrell Williams – $10M
Timbaland – $7M
Swizz Beatz – $6.5M
Nicki Minaj – $6.5M
Rick Ross – $6M (tie)
50 Cent – $6M (tie)
Pitbull – $6M (tie)
T-Pain – $5M
B.o.B – $5M
Despite Hov making a serious amount of cash, it’s still a huge decline from last year.
lulz @ “birdshit”
i’m guessing nr.5 ”birdshit” is birdman..
Wayne would have snagged that if he wasn’t in prison for 8 months of last year
i’m guessing nr.5 ”birdshit” is birdman.. haha
CONGRATS TO HOVA AND DAMN WIZ MADE 11 MILL LAST YEAR #THATSHITCRAE
how is diddy second i don’t know any one who buys his shit
How does Kanye put out 2 albums and still only outearn Lil Wayne by a million who was in jail for half of the past year?
@nito Diddy has that amazing deal with Ciroc
:/
Nothin’ that I didn’t know about last year. Congrats to all the people on this list, but…should I really care?
LUDAA!!!!
Props to Weezy for doing 8 months and still making good bread. I see you there Wiz. Pulling for more outright lyricists like J. Cole, Jay Elect, and Slaughterhouse to be on this list. Surprised Game isn’t on this list.
Nas Lost. All the skills in the world at emceeing and is being beat out by the likes of Wiz Khalifa. Respect to Jay though, may not be the most technically skilled, but is far ahead in the business aspect of it all.
Now wheres Lost Tapes 2!?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-FmteV8HcY&feature=player_embedded
Khalifa got that Black & Yellow money baby!
Pitbull making more than Nas, smarten up
nobody has the right to question wiz’s last bullshit album anymore haha
i’d make something that weak for that kind of money
ha. glad to see my nigga puff still on top and BY FAR. more of a hustla than any of your fakeass gangsta rappers. (anybody who calls him diddy is obviously a yungter/lame)
and wayne is still up there bcuz of the youngmoney album sales plus drake and nicki minaj’s albums that both went platnium. not to mention hes ALWAYS touring/plus features. hes a work-a-holic.
the only suprise for me is to see snoop. where the fuck did he come from?
Lol 50 Cent still makin money
diddy #2? that means WAY too many people still rockin Sean John…smh. lmao
Kanye put out one album and was in hiding for most of the year after the Taylor Swift business. Wayne dropped an album while in prison and I have a feeling part of their (Wayne & Birdman) money is off of Drake and Nicki anyway.
wiz’s weakass album isnt a result of his income. it is strickly from performances. dude probley made 5,000 from that shity rolling papers IF THAT! (seriously)
even though hes wack im surprised soulja boy isnt on this after droppin 40 mil on a plane lol
No one knows what it means, but it’s provocative… It gets the people going!
Some of you don’t understand business. The worth of a business is different than profits. profits are the remainder of money you have after operating cost. The music business is an expensive business. Rap arguably is the most expensive and now least profitable form of music. According to the latest Rolling Stone article, music just hit a growth since the early 2000s. This growth was generated from Country, Pop and select indie Rock hits/bands. Hip hop fans typically download albums rather than buying them. Diddy’s Ciroc is highy profitable, he can put out a flop of an album and still come in number too. Jay might lose money next year because of the lockout. I thought Kanye would have cleared 20 million min. Birdman and Wayne don’t pay their bills so their figures are skewed. Yesterday our country lost our AAA rating and the Dow dropped 400 points. Forget a recession its a depression everyone’s money is decreasing.
Watch the Throne
Kanye West x Jay-Z Tribute – Ni66as in Paris
http://jamesbryanchua.com/post/8692262042/kanye-west-x-jay-z-ni66as-in-paris
beyonce is so damn bad in that picture…. her smile is perfect
damn…rick ross & 50 cent tied. The irony.
But I actually expected drake to be a little higher with all his buzz.
@ houseostark, but your talking records sales. rappers make their money touring. they dont see any profit from their albums.
Actually album sales matter because another forms of music is gonna start capitalizing off it and influencing music more. If rappers just focus on show money then there leaving 100s of millions of dollars still on the table in sales. Other forms of music have loyal fans that actually pay so sooner or later rappers are gonna see that and start making pop albums because that makes more sense. Why cater to hardcore hip hop fans when making a pop record is way more profitable? Once hip hop loses to all other forms of music in album sales its gonna be a problem cause pop stars are gonna be the new leaders of music. Artist actually do see profit off album sales because where do you think the budget for their next album comes from?
u also have 2 remember that drake took a couple months off this year
HouseofStarks made some great ass points. I respect you for the stuff you say, dude.
And Hip Hop already lost to the other Genres when it comes to sales. Hip Hop fans are the less likely to buy an album, less alone support the artist. Rock fans will download a few albums here and there but they’ll ultimately buy them and they go to any concert they here of. Country leads in sales though.
@ marty, im talking rappers. rappers dont see any profit after the label recoups their advancemences and production costs. of course they get a budget for their next album, bcuz all the profit comes back to the label. its a win/win for them. plus the average rappers’ contract is for like 7years. so the rappers have no choice. its either make another record or try to eat of the past records.
but touring is the only way they make money for themselves unless they have a 360 deal, which the label gets a peice of everything.
and you right about the pop thing, puffs smartass been on that. and youngmoney is as well. wayne drake and nicki minaj are pop artists at this point, why u think they albums go platnium? those arent hardcore hiphop fans buying those albums.
7albums*
You dont create empires in business buy losing money because that doesnt make sense. It cost to promote and record and manufacture albums and it cost multi millions. So when the label doesnt get that back in effects every part of hip hop. From the artists to every other business connected to hip hop. Fans just dont want to think their hurting the artist but your actually killing the artists by taking millions of dollars out of their value. So now instead of a label giving 100% to promote a artist , their only gonna give about 25% percent because thats what the music is worth now. Business judges are artist based on numbers not lyrical bars so sales matter. Without album sales groups like Wu tang , Rocafella and Cash money would have never existed. Albums sale year after year , show money normally goes down after a few years if the artist hasnt made new albums. I like Jayz cause he aint rapping for himself , he’s rapping trying to keep value in the music. Downloading is cool cause I understand it but the culture has lost 100s of millions in the last ten years. That money in sales could have been used to create higher quality music. The label is not the enemy because the fans are doing more damage to the culture then the labels paying millions to keep it alive. To make a pop record doesnt even cost half of what it cost for a hip hop album but they see triple the return in investment. If hip hop fans really loved the music they wouldnt try to justify hurting the value of the artists in it. Just sayin
but when u talk wu-tang rocafella and cashmoney, that was back when ppl actually bought records. back when bonethugs went like 4xplatnium. im not talking about that time period, im talking bout the 2004 and on hulkshare and mediafire-movement. thats when rap albums hit a big decline in record sales.
only ones that were selling after 2004 was kanye(which after late registration started to become more pop) and the 2nd cashmoney era. to be specific 2007 when wayne became president. in the age of illegal downloads the only way u can sale records is to go pop.
and as for illegal downloading, it is what it is. some niggaz take advantage of it and get it free instead of paying for it. but its part of the game now. its like in bsktball when u got the players that just play dirty, it shows no integrity(spell check) or respect for the game but thats the time we’re in.
like how football is bascially touch football now, shit happens.
@the realest , all im saying is expect the sound of hip hop to change to pop music and R&B because making that real hip hop shit is career suicide cause it barely makes any impact in the mainstream. Show money does not mean that music is influencing culture. Our artist not even going platinum is a disgrace to the culture because every time our artists dont go platinum we are all looked at as losers and not even credible in music. There is no excuse because buying a album aint shit , your talking about ten dollars so even thought the fans say they aint got it I know thats bullshit. This shit is bigger then just music , hip hop saves peoples lives literally so when you dont even give a fuck about it your killing it. Its no need to debate because its enough fans out there to make all our artists go diamond and hip hop could take over the world , mite even change it for the better but the fans dont see the bigger picture.
@ marty, i agree with you. but my philosophy is where one thing dies, another is born. and with the internet age its allowing/forcing artists to be more independent. who needs a label anymore? you can make your own beats. you can promote yourself. and u can distribute your own music. and also artists will be giving away more free music. they make like 50songs when working on albums and only 15 actually make the record. like the big sean approach, he dropped 3mixtapes getting his fan base up till he drop the album for purchase. and the artists dont see the profits anyway. labels are an uneccessary middle-man now. we are in the beginning stages of a new era. give em time to figure out how to capitalize on it.
@the realest , right so the same people who claimed to be Big Sean fans actually let him down. You think a pop singer has to make 3 free albums before they put out a album for purchase? No , a pop singer makes one album and makes enough money to have a career and a better life for good. Hip hop fans force the artist to work three times as hard and then leave them out to dry. The internet have made artists more independent but it didnt make them better business men. Labels have connections and access to millions of dollars , the fans making music in their garage do not. Im not saying a artists needs a label but you cant compete because that would take 20 years before you are able to put yourself in the same position as Universal and not everybody has the business sense of Baby from Cash money. If you bring in the numbers then a label will do whatever you say just look at other forms of music. If hip hop albums flop left and right and the label keeps their own money that they put up in the first place you cant blame the label. Yes the label is a middle man between artists and fans but alot of independent artist are not business men and dont know how to handle or even get millions of dollars so how are they gonna compete against labels that been putting out music for 40 years? Like I said sales generates way to much money to just leave up for grabs for pop artists and country singers.
u right, not everybodys business minded, but they should. keep the independence.
and u right, pop singers dont have to do the mixtape thing, but thats bcuz pop artists follow the same proven formula to sell records: get an attractive face and make catchy songs that ppl will gravitate to. when those pop fans buy those albums, their not buying the album. their buying the single they heard on the radio and they got as their ringtone. but thats business for you. guarnteed profit.
there are a select few that actually make good records. like with rap. and another thing, rap is still a baby. how old is it? like 30? give it more time.
we hit a boom in the 90s when bonethugs and outkast was going diamond, then we fell into a recession with the internet. and over time we will pick back up. part of the problem is the fans and part is the marketing strageties.
Gotta give it to Wiz. Last year Drake asked him to go on tour with him and he said no and said Drake made 10 mill the previous year and he was tryna do that first and he did dat shit.
@ Pauly Dee, I appreciate the compliment man. I just want to be accurate and un-bias as possible. “The real is on the rise” !
@the realest: The 3 measurements of the success of an artist are record sales,tour, and critical acclaim/award shows. Most rappers today have profitable tours and only profitable tours. More notable rappers usually have differing 2/3 of the criteria. Superstars of any genre have all 3, Triple Threat. Marketing strategies if you have a target Market. If hip hop fans aren’t going to buy albums… a product is only a viable as its placement.
@Marty Mcfly : I agree with many of your points. Commercially it’s more beneficial for rappers to make a pop or mainstream album. On the other hand, Hip Hop is an art form and artist should respect their craft. Many Great thinkers, inventors, poets, musicians have lived poor and died broke but they remained faithful to their chosen passion. Hip- Hop Needs to find its honor again. Honor and integrity are timeless characters, Those characters produce legends and masterpieces.
@Marty
It seems like a lot of the comments seem to think its cheap to make a pop song, so I found this article to help. http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2010/12/02/131752531/how-to-write-a-hit-talk-like-a-teenager-but-keep-parents-in-mind
Kinda surprised how much it actually costs.
Hip hop fans take pride in degrading the value of money. High quality art should be valued and paid for so there is very little honor and integrity in being broke. I know what you mean but great thinkers should not be forced to slave for the culture and then hand over their work for free. All these fans who hate the power of money have a slave mentality because these white folks are gonna collect every dollar they can get with their corny music and lack of soul in their watered down bullshit. While hip hop artists put their real life on record and then are expected to stay broke just to “keep it real” and their fanbase rob them like the labels they say they hate. Shit is disgusting
Opps wrong article, here http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2011/07/05/137530847/how-much-does-it-cost-to-make-a-hit-song
@ Marty : In an ideal world I absolutely agree with you. that’s not the reality though although the reality should change. The music industry is constantly compared to prostitution. It’s an accurate comparison.
@C: Thanks for the link, that’s a good article, everyone should check it out.
how the FUCK did AKON make 13mill. He ent had a good sigle since im so padi!!
Akon gettin paid off that Lady Gsga and T-Pain money.
Wiz Khalifa? A 11 million? Wtf?
A pop record costs less to make than a hip-hop record? I’m gonna have to check on that. Idk man.
@House of Stark
“musicians have lived poor and died broke but they remained faithful to their chosen passion”
Yeah, but, umm…nobody trying to do that nowadays. Y’all kinda go too far when describing the move to more pop-oriented music. They’re not making garbage or music they absolutely hate to make a dollar. They’re trying to become versatile in a way that they’re trying to appeal to a mass audience, while still making the music they would make. Most of the artists that are BIG now, the music they’re making is the music they would’ve probably started making anyway. Rappers are entertainers, and they’re jobs are also to build a brand, which then sells show tickets and garners album sales. Just because you in particular, or underground hip-hop fans don’t like it doesn’t mean it’s good. The entitlement that hip-hop heads have that a rapper should rap harder, or have more complex lyricism just to please the thousands of them instead of the millions of everyday radio listeners, and actual album consumers is downright elitism. Cause that shit don’t make no type of sense. All artists learn sooner or later that RADIO PLAYS MATTER because if you don’t have that, even with the internet, your flame will be outed, and you’ll only have about only 100 of your fans actually checking for your shit when you have no money to even master your shit cause you have no platform to stand on.
*doesn’t mean it’s not good
Wtf happened to tip? he usually always on the list.
^Dude keep going to jail and fucking his money up. SMH. He’s one of my favorite rappers. I don’t think No Mercy did that good either. Which is a shame cause I think if he wasn’t going through all that shit he would’ve had more time to make a better album, cause we should all know Tip can make an album.
^agreed I still bump trap muzik and king. i hear he lost endorsements also.
I would have thought Eminem would be on the list off the shows him and Jay did. Plus the money he made from all those super bowl commercials.
niggaz seriouslly asking how is lil wayne getting that much money if he was in jail news flash he got 70% of drakes money lol did yall see the behind the scenes of the im on one video they were in drakes house it was an unfinished house drake is lucky he made so much money off of touring and shows and stuff lil wayne and birdman is buring him and didnt nicki minaj just set a record for album sails for woman..ummm yea thats why pddidy and jay-z will always be 1 and 2 they dont have tats all over there faces they can walk in those buildings with those rich white guys and the guys wont get turned off to invest in them
@airborne, you clearly didn’t look at my previous post. I don’t download leaks I actualy support the album/artist by buying a physical copy usually deluxe edition. So don’t talk to me about my audacity. I love good music regardless if it’s underground or mainstream. I’m just as likely to listen to drake as I am black hippy. No Mercy charted number one in hip hop/r & b. Tip’s s 7th album also is certified Gold.
No, I looked at your post. The part where I spoke about people criticizing the turn hip-hop took in going more pop as a bad thing was to you. After that was just general thoughts. I believe you when you say you support the artists.
Hip-Hop has been going pop for a while, ever since 2000 really. It’s just now accepted by a mass audience. Lady Gaga, Katy Perry and Nicki Minaj most likely share the same fanbase. Hip-Hop is a really diverse genre, cause it’s built off a lot of other genres, and it’s still young. This is Hip-Hop’s natural progression, as far as the radio goes.
^Natural progression to radio-friendliness is usually the worst thing that could possibly happen to a new genre, though. It’s what turned funk into disco, reggae into reggaeton, and rock and roll into whatever this awful shit is today.
@dmdori
Why is Drake even still on Cash Money? He should be getting ready to leave soon. That nigga is not getting all he should be getting from Baby’s stingy ass. Wayne ain’t even getting all he’s supposed to.
@Guy
Wow. No. I can’t comment on the funk into disco part, even tho I don’t see a lot of truth in that. Reggae into Reggaeton…no. 2 years ago reggae, such as Vybz Kartel, Movado, Serani, etc. was getting radio spins more than hip-hop songs, on hip-hop stations. That reggaeton shit was garbage, redundant and had nothing to do with reggae. Everyone should’ve known it was gonna die sooner or later(more sooner), I knew. Rock and roll…has always changed with the times. What are you expecting to hear? There’s more than plenty of indie stuff.
Rock and roll was always integrated with Pop. So you can’t even say Rock and roll went pop. It was Pop. Unless you’re talking like punk rock, or metal. Metal ain’t on the radio cause it ain’t pop(ular), and it ain’t pop(ular), cause it’s metal. And that shows you there’s always been sub-genres. What was Buddy Holly?
Rappers make like 200K if they sell a million copies. Shows bring the money, singles help. iTunes helps, amazon, etc. Digital sales give the artist more money I believe, since they dont have to get a chunk cut out to pay back the label for cost of merchandise.
Doesnt really make a difference anyways, if youre getting that $15 million… They must be doing something right, based on the avg salary for my neighborhood it would take 8-9 years to reach ONE million dollars. (If you dont spend a dime). I’m making less than 10k a year personally so that makes it a life time to get that much lmao
Ok, maybe we consider these genres differently, but Vybz Kartel, Movado, Sean Paul, etc. were EXACTLY who I was referring to when I said “reggaeton”. Please go listen to Peter Tosh, Scratch Perry or Bob Marley and try to tell me that was a good progression for the genre.
Rock and Roll has been dead since the late 70′s, and indie rock is a pathetic diversion from the discussion at hand, since we are talking about a progression to radio-friendliness. The Doors and Led Zeppelin didn’t try to make radio hits, they made great songs that literally inspired people to live on boats year round, just so that they could share the music with other people by broadcasting off-shore and around censors. Nobody in the entire world cares that much about Green Day, because they make radio-friendly shit rock.
And don’t bother trying to argue the funk/disco progression, that one is pretty much universally accepted, so please don’t make yourself look any more foolish that you already seem.
PS- This time, try to make points that don’t include radio airtime. Did u really just do that? lmao @ you
When you said you were referring to Vybz Kartel, Movado, Sean Paul as reggaeton, I stopped reading. I don’t feel like being aggravated. I’m convinced you’re an idiot, or really old, or trying to be old. Sean Paul has been holding reggae down since the 90s, you’re referring to more cultural reggae, that’s not the only reggae there is.
I’m referring to the (terrible) evolution of a genre. What did u think this discussion was about?
@airborne. I never stated mainstream hip hop was a negative. I was talking about the reasons why it’s occurred. Read my earlier comments and the discussion between Marty McFly, the realest in myself so you can understand the context of my comments.
how THE fuck did birdman make the list?
were soulja boy name at i thought he bought a 55 million sumin dollar plane or sum shit…
I appreciate reading most of the comments from intelligent bloggers like @HouseofStark, @the_realest, @Marty Mcfly, @Airborne just to name a few! I know a lot of you guys are not only music lovers but also creators as well. Hip Hop is very young as we know, but in its essence, is more of an Informative artform rather than a career even tho it has been in business for quite sometime.
I know a lot of different artist in the likes of, say a Kendrick Lamar, or even another immortal technique as far as their content goes. What I feel is a big problem is the lack of education to our culture about how business really works and applying it to an artform like Hip Hop! Especially when we take something that is like our brain child and see it get trashed on after taken our sweet time to create something for fans (future or present)! It breaks you down and make you want to limit who you choose to show your art!
I just sharing thoughts tho. Its a lot behind this shit! There’s obviously a big change in the world happening and its effecting every aspect of our lives. Including the music that choose to support/forced to listen to!
Damn Wiz doubled Nicki & Ross. Would’ve never guessed that.