Trawling through ‘type beats’ on YouTube is always a wonderful experience. Titles advertise almost perpendicular crossovers like ‘Kanye West x Charli XCX Type Beat’ as aspiring rappers post heartwrenching lyrics to their own songs in the comment section, only to receive zero likes in return. But don’t let the low view counts deceive you: rappers have been hitting up type beats for inspiration for years now, with some even becoming global hits.

This culture is the driving force behind Chicago rap veteran Mick Jenkins’ latest EP, TYPE SH*T, which is exclusively composed of ‘Mick Jenkins Type Beats’ he found online. “A huge nod to the type beat culture on YouTube,” he wrote on an Instagram post yesterday (January 17). “I wanted to show my love to that world, since it was where I truly began to find my way in rap.” The “MOVIN’” rapper also used the moment to make a comment on the industry at large, releasing the project on ethical music platform even.biz and calling out the stark underpayment of artists in the streaming era. 

As a whole, the world of type beats is firmly woven into these shifts in how music is produced and consumed. Today’s internet-savvy generation can short-circuit the music industry’s arduous path of studio time and label meetings with bedroom recording setups and ‘affordable’ production software. Over the last decade, hitherto unknown artists have created global hits and revolutionised musical canon on a shoestring budget but, as Mick Jenkins points out, that doesn’t mean they’re always compensated fairly.

Below, we spotlight five other times type beats went mega-viral.

LIL NAS X, “OLD TOWN ROAD”

You really don’t get more viral than this, do you? “Old Town Road” not only smashed streaming records when it dropped back in 2018, but also exposed double standards in the music industry when it was abruptly pulled from country charts for allegedly not being “fit” for the genre. Behind this crossover mega-hit, however, was then-19-year-old Dutch producer YoungKio, who uploaded the beat to his YouTube channel in early 2018 and later sold the lease to Lil Nas X for $30 on BeatStars. While the instrumental is no longer available (not surprising, the track won two Grammy Awards and went 17 times Platinum in the States), YoungKio was soon signed to UMG and has since worked with Lil Pump and Rico Nasty.  

DESIIGNER, “PANDA”

The funny thing about this track is that, while “Panda” was notorious in the English-speaking world for catapulting the boomer hate parade on so-called ‘mumble rap’ into popular discourse, many Filipino rap fans actually see Flow G and Skusta Clee’s “Panda (REMIX)” as the OG version, which was released less than a month later. There are lovable aspects to both: where G and Clee opt for horrorcore, helicopter-style delivery, Desiigner takes a catchy, chorus-driven approach.  

Behind both of these cultural phenomena, however, was then-22-year-old Mancunian producer Menace, who sold the beat to Desiigner for just $200. The humble producer’s bragging rights only grew when none other than Kanye West interpolated a heavily modified version of the track on “Father Stretch My Hands, Pt. 2”, off The Life of Pablo album. 

POP SMOKE, “DIOR” 

The drill sound – filled with sliding 808s and attack-maxes hi-hats – was born from an unlikely cultural dialogue between the US and UK. It was London-based producer 808Melo who helped provide these innovations with the prolific yet unrefined Chicago drill production style in the late 2010s, and these flows came full circle when the late New York driller Pop Smoke stumbled across 808Melo’s beats on YouTube. 

“I go into the studio [with Pop Smoke] and play the ‘Dior’ beat,” Melo explains in this Genius interview.  “The engineer was getting gassed, but he was looking at me like, ‘I’ve heard this beat before.’ Then Pop Smoke turns around and goes, ‘I’ve got a tune with this beat!’ This guy ripped it off YouTube!” 

NLE CHOPPA, SHOTTA FLOW

Seven remixes, well over a billion collective views, and guest appearances from Blueface and Lil Mabu, NLE Choppa’s “Shotta Flow” was the beat that kept on giving. While various industry hands have touched the instrumental over its five-year run (with the most recent remix releasing only ten months ago), it’s YouTube producer Midas800’s unsettling piano melody and off-kilter kicks that remain the enduring quality of “Shotta Flow”. 

Despite this gargantuan success, however, Midas800 seems to have remained relatively humble. Writing in response to one user’s declaration that “My guy made NLE Choppa’s career” in the comment section of the original beat upload, the producer says: “I appreciate the love fr but I wanna address this rq. Way before shotta flow choppa had already put in the work to build a buzz and a fan base, the beat just took him further I CANT take full credit for his career taking off. I CAN say the sound I gave ‘em changed hip hop forever.”

SHEFF G, “FLOWS”

Now, this one isn’t notable just for the number of views “Flows” accumulated, but also the sheer number of tracks that used the very same beat. At the risk of exposing my own distant bedroom rap career (I admittedly had to trawl five years back in my top-secret YouTube instrumental playlist to find the original upload), I remember coming across a ‘J-Cole Type Beat’ on a late-night freestyle session that immediately sounded familiar. It’s not hard to see why, with a strong melody and BPM that finds an unlikely cross-appeal between drill, grime and lo-fi hip hop, the beat was able to captivate rappers all over the world. By my own count, there’s Sheff G’s “Flows”, Jafro’s “[Unclassified]” JDZ Freestyle, Argentinian star C.R.O’s “CIUDAD GRIS”, Oso Wavey Jay’s “Soulja”, and no doubt countless more.