Rappers who were born filthy rich (first group of 10)

When it comes to a rapper's image, their "come up" story is almost as important as how well he or she can actually flow on the mic. Whether that means being raised in the projects, selling drugs to get by, or serving time for living that thug life, relatable hardship is what earns a rapper respect. Unlike virtually any other aspect of life, growing up loaded puts you at a disadvantage if your life goal happens to be to kill it in the rap game, but that hasn't stopped these silver-spooners from dedicating their lives to making beats and rhymes.
From the sons and daughters of established rappers, to Kid Rock, who bankrolled an early album with a loan from his car dealership owner dad, to the son of Nike Founder Phil Knight, who failed his way upward from writing wack rhymes to running an animation studio, there are rags-to-riches stories here.
These are the rappers who were born filthy rich.

Rich Hil


Richard Hilfiger (aka ) is the son of fashion icon Tommy Hilfiger. Born and raised on the mean streets of Greenwich, Conn., which he calls "The Cut," Rich couldn't look less like what you'd expect from an heir to a yuppie fashion empire. Rich is covered head to toe in tattoos and generally looks like he could use a bath and several days of sleep.

Like him or not, the guy is prolific. According to The Observer, he's been known to record four or five songs per night, a rapid rate of production which has spawned three studio albums and more than 18 mixtapes, which he reportedly used to give away for free. Hil also seems to be trying to live by his rap lyrics, which according to him are about "girls, love, loss, being high, and that's about it." He's done the rehab thing, had a high-profile relationship with pop star Rita Ora, and been arrested for punching a nightclub bouncer. If there was a how-to manual for transitioning from rich kid to rapper, Ricky's life would be it.

Lil Romeo


 appeared on MTV Cribs when he was just 12-years-old. Granted, his hit song, "My Baby," had already peaked at no. 1, but it wasn't his own wealth he was flaunting. That's because Lil Romeo is the son of Master P, the rapper-turned-music mogul who once described his goals to the The New York Times as, "I guess I want to be the ghetto Bill Gates." That's why instead of just becoming a rapper, Master P started his own label, No Limit, and disrupted the entire rap game with a new method of servicing fans.

Master P's strategy paid off. At the time of this writing, he had a reported net worth around $375 million, despite the decline of No Limit through the early 2000s and a bankruptcy filing. So, no, Master P hasn't reached that billionaire status yet, but he's doing just fine.
Lil Romeo, who now just goes by Romeo, was never able to duplicate the initial success of his first two albums, but he's continued to dish out new music, and let's not forget, he's always going to be the son to a dad who thought it was appropriate to give a 12-year-old a custom Mercedes, even though his feet probably couldn't reach the pedals, so we suspect Romeo is doing just fine, too.

Gabe Day


In 2013, multiple Oscar-winning actor Daniel Day-Lewis' son, Gabe (then known as ) released a video for his song, "Green Auras." It was basically a rap ballad to weed, in which Gabe claims he uses the drug for "self-medication" to cope with the pressures of being compared to his dad.

He also spits the line, "Call me Gabe Day and not Gabe Day-Lewis, because if you're trying to call me out I'm 'bout to Gabe Day-Lose-It," which effectively put an end to any further rap aspirations this guy had. Either Gabe recognized the cringe-worthiness of the video — which was shot on campus at Sarah Lawrence College, which we believe is known as "the Compton of the Ivy League" — or it understandably didn't go over well with his notoriously press-shy dad, because it's no longer online. Except in this video, in which these two guys gleefully bash him.

Gabe has since moved on to "light modeling" after a chance encounter with Karl Lagerfeld outside a Parisian cafe where they reminisced about spending a week together at the fashion mogul's beach home. Gabe has also supposedly turned down acting offers and is focusing on reinventing himself as a more self-reflective pop singer/songwriter, which is a good move, because something tell us there's probably a pretty small audience of rap fans who can relate to how bad it sucks to be Daniel Day-Lewis' kid.

Chilly Tee


There must be something about being a rich white kid that inspires rap lyrics, because like Gabe Kane, Travis Knight adopted an MC handle and tried to make it in hip-hop. Travis, who rapped under the name , is the son of billionaire Nike founder Phil Knight,

MCA then linked Chilly up with veteran hip-hop producers The Bomb Squad, who according to Willamette Week, were "the production crew behind just about every Public Enemy project, not to mention classics by Ice Cube and Slick Rick." Though they produced a record that Bomb Squad lead producer Hank Shocklee claims "still holds up," Get Off Mine was not a success. It would be Chilly's first and last attempt at rap domain.

now renamed Laika, in what some viewed as blatant nepotism. For as bad as Travis was at rapping, he apparently excelled at running an animation studio. He shepherded the company to great success with the movies Coraline (2009), ParaNorman (2012), and The Boxtrolls (2014), and perhaps more importantly, he no longer thinks rapping

 Kid Rock


Though has since morphed into more of a rock/country artist, he started out as a rapper. Born in Romeo, Mich., near Detroit

 Kid Rock's dad owned a Lincoln-Mercury dealership, but the two didn't get along, which led to the self-proclaimed American badass

Despite their differences, Kid Rock's dad eventually bankrolled his third album, Early Mornin' Stoned Pimp, which, in a slightly less honest turn, contains the boast, "I'm self-made like Henry Ford," in the song "Paid." Now, we could be wrong here, but we don't remember Henry Ford using an $8,500 handout from his dad to produce a song called "Blow Me," but we're not automotive history scholars, so who's to say? The important thing here is that a family was restored, and the world wouldn't be deprived of Kid Rock's many valuable contributions to the world of music, including the songs "Drunk in the Morning" and "Cadillac P***y."

 Quincy


After his 2008 episode of My Super Sweet Sixteen in which he received a 1964 Lincoln Continental and a brand new Range Rover, Quincy Brown rebranded himself as "International," a rapper and aspiring actor. He started doing live shows on his Ustream channel before anyone knew that was even a thing. He's also been active on YouTube for years, has his own production company, and has helped create celebrity kickball and football charity events. His musical talents are probably genetic — he's the biological son of singer "Al B.Sure!" — but his Renaissance Man approach to the entertainment business clearly comes from his adoptive father, Sean "Diddy " Combs.
Brown has since dropped the "International" and just goes by Quincy, which is good, because his previous name sounded like an Australian airport. He also signed a deal with Bad Boy/Epic Records, Diddy's label, and parlayed his role in the critically acclaimed movie Dope (2015)

Jermaine Dupri


rapper-turned-mogul 's book, Young, Rich, and Dangerous: The Making of a Music Mogul, he considers himself to be a self-made man. He wrote, "My achievements didn't come easy, no matter how it might look to people looking in from the outside." He's referring to the fact that at just 18 years old, he created the wildly successful hip-hop duo, Kris Kross, which was seemingly the jump-off for all of his success. Dupri also admits in the book that his musically-connected father, Michael Mauldin, nurtured his musical aspirations, going so far as to let his son perform as the opening act for the New York Fresh Fest when he was only 12 years old. It was this experience that propelled Dupri into the world of hip-hop.
Years later, at the height of Kris Kross' popularity, Dupri would again leverage his father's position with Columbia Records — where Maludin was an executive and would later become president — to broker a "$10 million dollar joint venture" with Dupri's fledgling label, So So Def. As a kid barely out of high school, Dupri found himself at the helm of a multi-million dollar musical empire. That's impressive, but there's no denying the young man had a leg up. And by "leg up," we mean he happened to know a big shot who used to change his diapers. Maybe that's what he meant in his hit single with Jay Z, "Money Ain't a Thing." For Dupri, it sure seems like it really never was.

LMFAO


 is the uncle and nephew duo who called themselves Redfoo (above right) and Sky Blu (not pictured). They're the guys whose hits songs "Sexy and I Know It" and "Party Rock Anthem" became the soundtrack to puking up Jell-O shots in frat party basements for an entire summer. They also happen to be the son, Stefan Kendal Gordy, and nephew, Skyler Austen Gordy, of Berry Gordy (above left), founder of Motown Records, who at the time of this writing has an estimated net worth of around $345 million. So, it's clear why these guys were in the mood to party all of the time.
Berry couldn't be prouder of his blood.

He told The Hollywood Reporter, "At a time like now, people need what they give — love, happiness, a party — and they're doing it better than anybody I've seen in a long time … They're making the world a better place." While we think the world would be just fine without a dude in a cheetah print Speedo gyrating next to his nephew, we see Gordy's point. It's about fun. It also means Gordy's musical legacy, which includes iconic songs such as The Jackson 5's "ABC" and "I'll Be There," now also includes a song with the following lyrics: "I got passion in my pants and I ain't afraid to show it, show it, show it, show it."

Reginae Carter


Originally part of the now defunct girl group, The OMG Girlz, , daughter of rapper Lil Wayne, used to sing alongside fellow rapper T.I.'s daughter, Zonnique Pullins, about deep topics such as couture clothes and boys. The group broke up in 2015, but it seemed Carter already had her eyes on the rap game. She put out her solo track, "Mind Goin Crazy," in 2014, but at the time of this writing, she has yet to follow it up. Maybe that's because she was busy writing books, serving as a brand ambassador for a hair care company, and launching a clothing line called Shut Up – all before deciding to enroll in college full time to learn the ins and outs of the media business. Clearly, this young woman is all about building an empire.

While Lil Wayne is certainly supportive of his daughter's ambitions, to him, she's still obviously daddy's little girl. To wit: For three of her consecutive birthdays, Weezy has given her a car: A BMW for her sweet 16, a Ferrari at 17, and a Range Rover at 18. At this rate, she really doesn't need to build her own successful business since her dad seems dead set on turning her into a used car dealer.

Jaden Smith


While an argument can be made that the linguistic artistry of  needed no further outlet than his bizarre Twitter account, neither that nor the fact that he's the son of A-Lister's Will and Jada Pinkett Smith stopped him from jumping into the rap game. Though he's released tracks for years, like 2012's "The Coolest," which was undeniably reminiscent of his dad's "Fresh Prince" style, he finally released his first full-length album, SYRE, in November 2017.

Of the project, Jaden told Billboard, "It's really just become a legacy of this guy, this kid, who chases the sunset … And then one day, it chases him back and he can't get away," which is the most Jaden-est way to describe an album. Unfortunately, the young artist's freshman attempt didn't exactly garner critical praise, and his contemporaries weren't so thrilled about it, either. 

Former buds such as Drake, Kanye West, and Donald Glover have allegedly turned their backs on him. "It's more like, 'You can't hang out with us anymore,'" Jaden told Complex of the shift in vibe after his album release. "'We didn't know you were making an album this whole time. We thought you were just Little Homie giving us free water and s**t. You're not really cool with us anymore,'" he continued. Oof, sounds like a few diss tracks might be on the way.

SOURCE: NIKKI SWIFT