Metro Boomin is Dominating the Rap Community

By Ariana Mendoza

Music Journalist

Leland Tyler Wayne, popularly known as Metro Boomin, is nothing new to the music industry. He has created many hits since he first started his career in 2009 at age 16.

Metro moved to Atlanta after his mixtapes received a lot of attention from big Atlanta rappers like Future, Young Thug, 21 Savage, Gucci Mane and Migos. Following his first extremely successful release, Tuesday by iLoveMakonnen and Drake in 2014, he has had an endless amount of number one songs in the U.S. These songs consist of “Congratulations” by Post Malone and “Heartless” by The Weeknd, just to name a few.

In more recent years, Metro had started a trilogy project and dropped his debut album ‘Not All Heroes Wear Capes’ in 2018. This is where we see Metro make a mark with his own discography. This album had dropped after a ‘fake retirement’, returning with bang and introducing a new era of Metro Boomin. He had also  done a collab album with 21 Savage, ‘Savage Mode II’ released in 2020. Again, after two years with no new music following the first Savage Mode album in 2018. Savage Mode II was more cinematic with each song leading into one another and with the narration by Morgan Freeman. This record was both 21 and Metros second U.S number one album.

In December of 2022, Metro Boomin released his second part of his trilogy, ‘Heroes and Villains’, which in my opinion is the first project of his back-to-back releases where we find him taking off absolutely everywhere. This album includes many features of many popular artists, like Travis Scott and Don Toliver. It also reached into the top ten in many countries with the song “Creepin” featuring The Weeknd and 21 Savage.

Shortly after this release, he produced the soundtrack to the most popular movie of 2023, Spider-man: Across the Spider Verse.  This record also had some big named artist with features from ASAP Rocky, JID, James Blake, Coi Leray and Swae Lee who was also on the hit single, Sunflower, from the first Spider-man film. Metro even got an easter egg in the film and got to be a Spider-man with a line in the movie. This movie and soundtrack was a major pop culture moment for the POC rap community. The film features the culture African American/Puerto Rican character and Metro’s soundtrack. He also performed at the biggest festival in the U.S, Coachella, back in April. Now to top it all off he was the executive producer for Young Thug’s most recent album ‘Business is Business’, which was released June 23. In 2023, he’s keeping busy and staying fresh on everyone’s mind.

With these back-to-back releases in the span of only six months, Metro Boomin has become the new voice of rap and hip-hop. Along with his iconic producer tags, he has such a deep, dark unique sound and is continuously integrating it into the rap community. Not only are these rappers recognizing this, but the fans are too! He has been getting more and more recognition nowadays and I believe it’s completely deserved.