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Fetty Wap

Best known for his summer anthem 'Trap Queen', hip-hop star Fetty Wap's unique, melodic rapping style took him from the New Jersey housing projects to the top of the US charts. Raised in the city of Paterson, Fetty (real name Willie Maxwell) comes from a Haitian family. He suffered a childhood accident that led to him developing glaucoma and losing the vision in his left eye. He dropped out of school in the tenth grade and was turned on to music by rap idols such as Gucci Mane and Young Jeezy, cutting his teeth on street corners and performing on mixtapes with his Remy Boyz crew and Zoo Gangs collective. Influenced more by the woozy, trap style of Southern rap than the local East Coast stars, Fetty Wap's reputation spread through word-of-mouth and critical buzz and he had been rapping for only three years when his single 'Trap Queen' made him one of the breakthrough stars of 2015. Telling the tale of a romance between a drug-dealing couple, the track's recognisable lo-fi, strutting beat grew in popularity on social media and went on to reach number two in the US and became a big global hit. With its mix of modern R&B hooks and club-friendly hip-hop anthems, his debut album 'Fetty Wap' featured close friend Monty and several long-time, neighbourhood collaborators, shooting to number one on the US Billboard Charts and becoming one of only a handful of albums to reach one billion on-demand streams. Follow-up singles '679' and 'My Way' also made the US top ten and Fetty Wap made a string of high profile guest appearances on stage with Taylor Swift and Kanye West as well as producing mixtapes with French Montana and PnB Rock. There were also popular collaborations with Snoop Dogg, Nicki Minaj and Gwen Stefani before he returned in 2018 with new EP 'For the Fans III' and mixtape 'Bruce Wayne'.