Lil Wayne

• 1. Introduction

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  Lil Wayne left school in tenth grade because his mother found a gun in his school bag. He was fifteen years old, already signed to a major label, already earning money, and already afraid enough of his neighborhood that he packed a weapon for the walk to class. That single detail cracks open something essential about Dwayne Michael Carter Jr. , the contradictions are not incidental. They are the architecture of his entire life.

  Born on the 27th of September 1982, in the Hollygrove neighborhood of Uptown New Orleans, Carter grew up in the 17th Ward, one of the city's most impoverished corners. His father abandoned the family when Carter was two years old. He wrote his first rap song at age eight. By age eleven he had signed with Cash Money Records. By age twelve he had survived a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the chest.

  What follows is the story of how a boy from Hollygrove became one of the best-selling music artists in the world, how he reinvented the mixtape, survived imprisonment, battled his own label, and quietly shaped the sound of an entire generation of hip-hop that came after him.

• 2. Hollygrove and the Cash Money Door

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  In the summer of 1991, a nine-year-old Carter met Bryan Williams on the streets of New Orleans. Williams went by the name Baby, and would later become known as Birdman, the co-founder of Cash Money Records. He recognized something in the boy and mentored him, bringing him onto Cash Money tracks and encouraging his love of hip-hop. Carter, in return, would call Williams' answering machine and leave freestyle raps on it.

  Two years later, in 1993, Birdman discovered Carter formally and signed him to Cash Money Records at age eleven. At that point Carter was performing under the name Baby D, a nod to his given name, Dwayne. It was not yet the name that would become famous, but the machinery was already in motion.

  In a 2009 interview on CBS News with anchor Katie Couric, Carter explained why he dropped the D from Dwayne. "I dropped the D because I am a junior. My father, he's livin', and he is not in my life and he's never been in my life. So I don't wanna be Dwayne. I'd rather be Wayne." Couric asked if his father knew. Carter chuckled and said, "He knows it now."

  Carter has said he considers his deceased stepfather, Reginald "Rabbit" McDonald, to be his real father. He has a tattoo dedicated to McDonald. Carter was enrolled in the gifted program at Lafayette Elementary School before attending Eleanor McMain Secondary School, where he was an honor student, a drama club member, and played the Tin Man in the school's production of The Wiz.

• 3. A Near-Fatal Moment

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  In 1994, when Carter was twelve years old, he suffered a gunshot wound to his chest that nearly killed him. At the time, he described the shooting as accidental. In September 2018, however, Carter revealed in interviews that it had in fact been a suicide attempt, triggered by his mother telling him he would have to give up his rap-related activities.

  Off-duty police officer Robert Hoobler, whom Carter calls "Uncle Bob", is credited by Carter with saving his life. Hoobler insisted that the dying child be driven immediately to the hospital in a police car rather than waiting for an ambulance to become available. Carter has pointed to Hoobler, who lived from 1956 to 2022, as the reason he survived that day.

  The wound healed, and Carter returned to music. Within months he was recording with Christopher Dorsey, the Cash Money rapper known as B.G., a longtime friend who would become his first musical partner. The two formed a duo called the B.G.'z, with B.G. going by "Lil Doogie" and Carter still operating as "Baby D". They released one album together, True Story, in 1995.

• 4. The Hot Boys and First Success

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  In 1997, Carter joined a four-man hip-hop group with B.G., Juvenile, and Turk. They called themselves the Hot Boys, and Carter, at age fourteen, was the youngest member. Their debut album, Get It How U Live!, came out that same year and included the charting single "We on Fire".

  The group's second album, Guerrilla Warfare, released in 1999, reached number one on the Billboard Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart and number five on the Billboard 200. It was accompanied by the single "Bling Bling", shared with Cash Money duo Big Tymers, which appeared on B.G.'s solo album Chopper City in the Ghetto in April 1999. Carter's verse appeared only on the radio version, while he performed on the chorus of the album cut. That same year, Carter was featured on Juvenile's single "Back That Azz Up", which reached number eighteen on the Billboard Hot 100.

  Carter's debut solo album, Tha Block Is Hot, followed on the 2nd of November 1999, when he was seventeen years old. It debuted at number three on the Billboard 200 and was certified platinum by the RIAA in December 1999, less than a month after its release. The album earned Carter a 1999 Source magazine nomination for Best New Artist. The lead single carried the same title as the album, with its chorus performed by his Hot Boys colleagues Juvenile and B.G.

• 5. Mixtapes and the Reinvention of a Career

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  After Tha Carter II arrived on the 6th of December 2005 and debuted at number two on the Billboard 200 with more than 238,000 copies sold in its first week, Carter made an unusual choice. Instead of rushing a follow-up album, he turned to the mixtape circuit. Dedication 2, released in 2006 with DJ Drama, contained the track "Georgia Bush", in which Carter critiqued former U.S. president George W. Bush's response to Hurricane Katrina and its impact on New Orleans. Da Drought 3, released in 2007 and available as a free legal download, featured Carter rapping over beats from recent hits by other musicians.

  Hip-hop publications including XXL and Vibe covered Da Drought 3 extensively. Christian Hoard of Rolling Stone magazine considered Da Drought 3 and The Drought Is Over 2 "among the best albums of 2007". At the end of that year, an MTV poll named Carter "Hottest MC in the Game", The New Yorker ranked him "Rapper of the Year", and GQ called him "Workaholic of the Year".

  During this period without a solo album, Carter appeared as a featured performer on a string of charting singles, including "Make It Rain" by Fat Joe, a Scott Storch production that peaked at number thirteen on the Hot 100 and was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group. He also appeared on tracks from Jay-Z's American Gangster and Kanye West's Graduation. Carter was reshaping what a rapper's career could look like, building his reputation track by track rather than album by album.

• 6. Tha Carter III and the Peak

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  Tha Carter III was originally scheduled for 2007, but leaks pushed it back. An EP, The Leak, was released digitally on the 25th of December 2007 to manage the anticipation. The full album finally arrived on the 10th of June 2008, and its first-week sales exceeded one million copies domestically, the first album to achieve that figure since 50 Cent's The Massacre in 2005.

  The lead single, "Lollipop", featuring Static Major, reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 and became Carter's first number one as a solo artist. The album also produced "A Milli" and "Got Money", featuring T-Pain, which peaked at number thirteen. The Recording Industry Association of America certified the album two times platinum on the 14th of July 2008.

• 7. Rikers, Recovery, and the Label War

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  On the 22nd of October 2009, Carter pleaded guilty to attempted criminal possession of a weapon stemming from a 2007 arrest in New York City. His sentencing was delayed multiple times, including once in February 2010 due to dental surgery that involved eight root canals, the replacement of several tooth implants, and additional dental work. On the 8th of March 2010, he received a one-year sentence and was sent to Rikers Island.

  His eighth album, I Am Not a Human Being, was released on his 28th birthday, the 27th of September 2010, while he remained incarcerated. It eventually reached number one on the Billboard 200, making him the first rapper to hold a number one album while imprisoned since Tupac Shakur's Me Against the World in 1995. Carter was released from Rikers Island on the 4th of November 2010, after serving eight months of his sentence.

  The release of his twelfth studio album, Tha Carter V, was held up for years by a financial dispute with Cash Money Records. On the 6th of June 2018 it was confirmed that Carter had been released from Cash Money. Tha Carter V finally appeared on the 27th of September 2018, Carter's 36th birthday, debuting at number one on the Billboard 200 with 480,000 album-equivalent units including 140,000 pure album sales. It was also Carter's fourth number-one Billboard 200 album, and every song on it charted on the Billboard Hot 100 simultaneously.

• 8. Legacy and Reach

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  On the 27th of September 2012, Carter became the first male artist to surpass Elvis Presley's record for the most entries on the Billboard Hot 100, reaching 109 songs. He has sold more than 120 million records worldwide, including more than 25 million albums and 95 million digital tracks in the United States.

  In 2005 Carter founded Young Money Entertainment as an imprint of Cash Money and Universal Music Group. The label went on to sign Drake, Nicki Minaj, and Tyga, among others. Both Drake and Nicki Minaj have cited Carter directly as an influence on their careers. Other artists who have named him as an influence include Kendrick Lamar, Future, Young Thug, Lil Baby, and The Kid Laroi.

  Carter has cited Missy Elliott as his single biggest musical influence, saying she is "a huge influence of everything I've ever done". He has also named Goodie Mob, Tupac Shakur, The Notorious B.I.G., Jay-Z, T-Pain, Prince, Wyclef Jean, Lauryn Hill, Erykah Badu, Alicia Keys, and Lenny Kravitz as significant inspirations. He credits Jay-Z specifically for inspiring him to freestyle while recording over an instrumental rather than writing lyrics down first.

  In November 2024, during the Lil WeezyAna Fest, New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell gave Carter a Key to the City. Master P announced the creation of the NOLA Walk of Fame at the same event and presented Wayne with a fleur-de-lis plaque. The city also designated the 6th and the 7th of February as "Lil Wayne Day" going forward. His fourteenth album, Tha Carter VI, was released in June 2025.