Hip-Hop Lives Here
Hip-Hop Lives Here
Lil Baby can add another point on his board of chart-topping success and commercial accomplishments, as we have the official reported first week sales for his new album WHAM. According to HITS Daily Double, the project sold 144K equivalent units in its first week, securing another No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 albums chart and marking his fourth record to top the list. Thanks to a surge in pure sales from what the report indicates, this celebratory moment comes after the release of a deluxe version that should boost the LP some more in the coming weeks, which should be interesting.
You may know that Lil Baby and Bad Bunny were in a tight race for the first No. 1 album of 2025, the latter of which sold 118K units in its first week. DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS came out around midday local time on a Sunday, and both artists should feel very proud about their work and how it's resonated with their core audiences. They also have plenty of time and momentum to find even more chart success this year, as they have big plans to give their records more care, promotion, excitement, and opportunities for fan connection.
In Lil Baby's case, he has a whole other new album ready for later in 2025 titled Dominique, and with WHAM's precedent in mind, it could very well go No. 1, too. We wonder whether or not this will mark a different sound and approach when compared to previous releases or if it's just simply more of what die-hards already appreciated about this recent LP. Either way, we're sure that hits will emerge from it and it will cause another big splash.
While WHAM has its fair share of critics, it became hard for Lil Baby to fail, since fans waited over two years for a new album and welcomed his usual style with ease. Regardless of what you think of the project, at least we don't have to have that same tired 2023 conversation about rappers not going No. 1 anymore. There is so much great hip-hop to come not just from him, but from the culture at large this year.
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Quando Rondo has officially turned himself in to begin serving his 33-month sentence after pleading guilty to drug conspiracy charges, earlier this year. The Express Tribune reports that he'll mostly likely spend his time behind bars at either FCI Jesup or FCI Estil. With his plea deal, he also was ordered to pay a $40,000 fine and will undergo three years of supervised release. That will include mandatory mental health counseling and routine drug testing.
Rondo originally pled guilty in August, telling Rolling Stone outside of the courthouse: “I really want to give an apology to the city of Savannah. And I want to give an apology to my family and friends, loved ones, and most of all my daughters for taking all my family and all my loved ones through this stressful point.”
As news of Rondo starting his sentence hit social media, fans shared plenty of supportive messages. Taking to X (formerly Twitter), one user wrote: "Street life caught up. Hope he uses this time to flip the script and come back stronger. Redemption ain't a straight line, it's a maze." Another added: "It’s sad to see but I pray he finds his way in life!"
Ahead of his decision to turn himself in, Rondo revealed on social media that he was considering a retirement from music as his sentence loomed. "I just caught 33 months, the whole world know it," he wrote on his Instagram Story. "And mf still got they hand out don't worry bout it tho. If promised anybody something. There [sic] going to get it, my word is my word. But on everything I love, once I do this lul time, I promise you I'm disappearing and never talking to people again!" Assuming Rondo follows through on the terms of his release, he could be a free man again by October 2027.
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