Chance the Rapper Talks 50 Years of Hip-Hop: 'Without Rap, I Wouldn't Be Able to Be Chance the Rapper' (Exclusive)

The Chicago Grammy champ breaks down the music that shaped his palette, being known as "the rapper" and what he hopes for the next 50

Chance the Rapper may be the rapper, but he’s first and foremost a rap fan from Chicago.

He fell in love with hip-hop through a Nas song meant for kids, realized its power through The College Dropout, and knew he was ready to do it all himself thanks to Lil Wayne’s legendary ‘00s mixtape run.

And now, as he celebrates hip-hop’s 50th anniversary along with other influential figures who’ve continued to shape the genre and culture into a global force, Chance is reflecting on all that brought him to where he is today — as a man in pursuit of something bigger than the music.

“It's a part of the story,” Chance, 30, says of his contributions to hip-hop. “It's a part of the story of Black liberation. It's a part of the story of ownership. It's a part of the story of reclaiming our story.”

“I love that I get to be 100% myself and still be a rapper. And I love that what I feel like I've given to the game is myself, 100% my truth, my life, my story. And there'll never be another Chance the Rapper. And I love that. And hip-hop gave that to me. You know what I mean? I would've always been Chance regardless, but without rap, I wouldn't be able to be Chance the Rapper.”

Chance is one of the over 30 game-changing artists sharing their stories as part of PEOPLE’s celebration of hip-hop’s milestone 50th anniversary. For more on the anniversary, pick up the latest issue of PEOPLE, on newsstands Friday, or subscribe here.

What does the number 50 mean to you?

Oh, man. To me it instantly just reminds me, it's a testament to the durability and tenacity of Black folks, period. And just reminds me that this language and culture that we developed, that we had to develop out of necessity has been a real tool for mobility.

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Growing up as a kid in Chicago, do you remember the first song specifically that ever spoke to you?

When I got my first album. My first album was The College Dropout by Kanye [West]. And I heard “Through the Wire” on the radio and I remember that definitely molding my love for making original music. Because I was a dancer before that. I always loved music, but I didn't really value creating my own or trying to tell my own story. But I remember the first song that really turned me up as a kid and made me really love hip-hop, I remember it was Nas. It was like a song for kids. I'm trying to remember what it was. Oh, “I Can.” It was a Nas song when I was a kid that came out. And it was just all this educational information and also affirmations of knowing who we are. And I just remember that being something that I just loved when I was a kid. And it's kind of like I don't know if that's Beethoven. I don't know who it is that made that sample, but it's crazy.

Did that album make you feel like you could do this, or is there another that stands out more?

I always remember feeling a little bit left behind in the education system and not really feeling like it was meant for me to succeed. But the idea of being a success outside of that was something that was fairly new to me. And Kanye was just so proud and bold about his wants and needs as a human being and as a thought agent that it super inspired me. I was probably 10 or 11 years old knowing I wasn't going to college based off of that s---.

And I think it also, everybody lives in the mainstream until you do a little research. Everything that gets presented to you is typically the surface of it, where somebody else's regurgitation of what it is until you really get to, like I said, research that topic, and hip-hop to me outside of maybe... Because I always loved OutKast. Outside of maybe OutKast, my understanding of it was so based on the machismo, the braggadocios gangster identity. And there's so much hip-hop out there that was not like that.

But I do remember my first introduction to something that was counterculture within hip-hop was Kanye with the backpacks and polos and the high-pitched soul samples and rapping about his mom and rapping about being these things that just weren't considered traditional to me. And then after I did more in-depth research, again as a 10-year-old, trying to find more s--- that I like and getting blank CDs, mix CDs from people, the more I found that I loved it as a trade or as a craft.

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What was the most special part to you of growing up as a rap fan in the ‘00s?

Lil Wayne. Lil Wayne was the biggest thing that ever happened. And that was... I got to give a huge credit to Wayne for really making me want to rap. You know what I mean? I think Kanye made me want to be artistic and made me want to talk about different things. But the skill of rapping, I always say is unparalleled when it comes to Wayne and The Carter II and The Carter III and Da Drought mixtapes, The Drought Is Over mixtapes and No Ceilings and Sorry 4 the Wait, all these things like that. The '00s was my whole educational experience. I graduated from kindergarten in 1999. I graduated from high school in 2011. So those early '00s was very formative in terms of my way of thinking, what I value, what I enjoy. And Lil Wayne really just dominated that whole time period and really made a lot of s--- cool that wasn't black mainstream thought at the time. The skinny jeans, the skateboard, and his whole rockstar persona, everything that he did during that time was so iconic and different. And overall, just for me at least, life changing.

There's nobody else that I'm talking to for this magazine package that has the title of "rapper" in their name. Do you feel nowadays being known as "the rapper" gives you an added sense of, I guess not responsibility, but pride in representing the genre and the culture that you grew up on?

Absolutely. I feel like the more stuff that I delve into outside of what people consider to be rap, the more people try and encourage me to take that out of my name. And I really wear it as a badge of honor. Because rap means Black no matter how much the culture expands and grows. This is something that was created by Black folks in the '70s in the park. And it's a language and it's lifestyle. And if you go back to the pillars, it includes all these other modes of communication and art that allow me to understand that everything I do is a bar. So if I'm creating a breakfast program for kids on the south side to come do a books and breakfast, that's hip-hop, right?

It's community building. It's art and it's education. And so it's hip-hop to me. Like me, there's so many different examples I could give, but I always felt like rap, it's the Swiss Army knife. If you are a rapper, you're a lot of times the writer of the music. Whereas typically in mainstream music, songwriters are a big portion of... Or how do I say this? An amazing vocalist, that's a job, that's a talent in itself. And that could be a star created off of a collaboration of a bunch of people between producers and writers and all this stuff.

But when you're a rapper, you're expected to write your own raps. A lot of rappers produce their own music. A lot of rappers are their own stylists. Some rappers like myself and a lot of the rappers direct their own visuals. A lot of rappers manage themselves. It's like we got to put this whole thing together and stand and represent ourselves and then represent our communities and then represent our fans. I love that. I love that pressure on what that means about us as a people.

You were the first artist to win a Grammy for a project that was available only on streaming. That was a major moment, not just for you, but for hip-hop and music in general. In retrospect, what did it mean to have done that, not just for yourself, but for the mixtapes that came before Coloring Book, the ones that you grew up on?

Well, it's a really big deal to be recognized to do something. And I always say anytime I'm the first to do something, I don't want to be the last to do it or the only. I think that what people fail to mention a lot of times when they bring up that stat is like it's the first mixtape to win a Grammy. And the whole conversation around streaming really arose because there were so many projects that were being put out on free DSPs, like Audiomack and SoundCloud and stuff like that that couldn't be recognized because they weren't commercial projects.

And sometimes I get a little... It's something that I think everything can be improved upon. So the streaming model, when I released Acid Rap, was perfect because the intention wasn't to make money off of the streams. But now that that's the dominating mode of music, of people getting to music, there's a lot of restructuring that has to happen to make sure that it's fair.

It was [great] to be recognized and not have to change my mode of how I distribute my music to my fans. But I also feel like it can also be used to take the power from the artist. I really got a lot of offers from people that asked me to sell Acid Rap, to put out one copy that had an ISBN number or SRC code so that it could be eligible for the Grammys that year. And I didn't do it, because I liked the way that I was doing my music. And I think if... I'm glad that I didn't make that change, but I also, again, just feel like there's a larger conversation that needs to be made about making things equitable for the artists and the producers.

I'm sorry if that was too nuanced. I don't know. I should have just said, "I'm very happy."

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Where do you hope to see hip-hop in the next 50 years?

Man, I think hip-hop is going to be a big... I know hip-hop is going to be a big tool in reuniting the global Black family, creating equity for all peoples that are disenfranchised or oppressed, and the conversation starter and qualifier for some of the most important social issues.

The thing that I've been noticing a lot is there's a lot of young Palestinian rappers that are gaining, getting people education about Occupied Palestine, and they're going viral on the internet because they rap over old school hip-hop piece. And it just comes back to hip-hop being this voice for the voiceless and for the disenfranchisement for the oppressed, and an opportunity to speak on living conditions and the better world that we see.

And I think 50 years ago, s--- was very different, and a lot of the big changes came from Black groups like the Zulu Nation or Public Enemy or KRS-One. There's way more recent stuff too, obviously. I don't make it sound like I'm just trying to reach back to the earliest hip-hop I can think of, but I'm just saying there's been so many movements to keep hip-hop pure and not on some gatekeeper s---, but to keep the space open for a Chance the Rapper or the next or whoever to come through and talk that real s---. That's something that has been protected and I think will continue to grow over the next 50 years.

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