In 2001, when Georgia rapper Bubba Sparxxx landed at No. 15 on the Hot 100 with his debut single “Ugly,” the idea that country music and rap music could be fused together to make a hit record was still a complete anomaly. But country and rap have long had a relationship akin to distant cousins, dating back to the talking blues of Johnny Cash and the southern rap styles of artists UGK who paved the way for Sparxxx and Timbaland’s commercial breakthrough in the early aughts. 

In 2019, Lil Nas X’s (Chartmetric Rank 327) smash hit “Old Town Road” shattered any notion of distance between the genres, riding a wave of viral memes and remixes to record-breaking chart dominance. After a brief lull in the early 2020s, artists like BigXThaPlug (CM Rank: 414) and Bailey Zimmerman (CM Rank: 607) are picking back up that torch with their collab “All The Way,” which hit No. 4 on the Hot 100 in April.

This is one of countless examples of these two worlds merging closer than ever. Post Malone, whose career originally took off with a number of rap-leaning singles including “White Iverson,” has increasingly explored other genres. And his latest album, 2024’s F-1 Trillion, finds him exploring the country world quite deeply, collaborating with long-established stars (Tim McGraw), genre icons (Dolly Parton), and rising hitmakers (Lainey Wilson, Sierra Ferrell). Most notable is his hit single “I Had Some Help,” with Morgan Wallen, which now has over 1.2B streams on Spotify alone.

Wallen also merits his own mention in this conversation. Though he's most known for his country pop hits, becoming a world-beating star for this particular strain of the genre, he also has regularly accounted for the majority of country tracks in the Billboard Hot 100. In some ways, the rise of country rap can be seen as a reaction to this fusion of country pop in music spaces more broadly—artists in every genre seem to want a piece of what country’s charts rise has brought to songwriters in that world.

Social Media as the Catalyst

If country and rap had a casual flirtation in decades past, the social media era has poured fuel on the fire. In 2018, rapper Lil Tracy released “Like a Farmer,” a satirical track that found the Virginia artist adopting an exaggerated southern twang over trap drums. The song proved to be instantly reactive, inspiring viral memes on Twitter, racking up millions of streams on SoundCloud, and spawning a remix with Lil Uzi Vert. The commercial tipping point, launching the blend of country and rap from meme to mainstream success, came just a few months later in the form of Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road.” 

Originally released in 2018 on Lil Nas X’s YouTube channel, the song became a viral sensation in early 2019 when users began using the sound in viral TikTok videos — leading to parodies and remixes — and catapulting the song to the longest-ever No. 1 single ever on the Hot 100. It also shattered streaming records with nearly 140million Spotify streams in its initial release month and by mid 2019 and by the end of that summer, Lil Nas X had amassed over 47 million monthly listeners on the platform.

In the wake of “Old Town Road,” artists like Jelly Roll found new momentum as fans’ appetite for country-rap crossovers grew. The Nashville-born artist had spent more than a decade in the underground rap scene before shifting toward the country-infused sound that would bring him mainstream recognition. His breakthrough came with 2021’s “Son of a Sinner,” a raw crossover hit that was fueled by viral moments on platforms like TikTok and Facebook - building a deeply loyal fanbase long before radio caught on. Today, Jelly Roll is No. 1 artist on Chartmetric whose genre is primarily "Country-Rap."

Now, that same social media-driven energy is fueling the next generation of cross-genre hits. Take BigXthaPlug and Bailey Zimmerman’s “All The Way” — part of what makes it work so well is the contrast between the two genres, while still feeling like a natural collaboration. Listeners immediately responded: In its first full week, the song debuted at No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100. The song owed much of its quick success to momentum on TikTok; in the weeks leading up to the song’s release, both BigX and Zimmerman teased the track on their respective TikTok accounts, culminating in a video BigXthaPlug posted in the days before the release of the single which has since racked up more than 13 million views. In its first week, the song was streamed over  10 million times on Spotify. 

The success of “All The Way” is further proof that, in addition to launching viral records almost overnight, TikTok tends to flatten the difference between sounds and genres. For listeners, what matters most are distinct moods and themes: visual moments they react to, lyrics that inspire challenges and memes. 

Roots of a Crossover

In addition to a long history of dabbling in crossover between the genres, country and rap also have a shared lyrical lineage: both genres are heavily focused on storytelling, at times tending towards the point of view of the outlaw and at other times the heartbroken narrator. It’s no surprise, then, that in the wake of “All The Way” both BigX and Zimmerman’s monthly listener counts on Spotify spiked simultaneously and saw their listenership rise almost equally. In the month following the release of the song, BigX saw his listeners go from around 15.1 million to around 21 million, while Zimmerman’s listeners jumped from around 10 million to 15.8 million. This shared spike suggests an overlap in listeners between the two artists as listeners who may have stuck to one genre in the past fluidly move between different styles of popular music. For fans who are used to hearing both country and rap in equal measure but not necessarily in the same song, singles like “All the Way” are both familiar and novel, working as a perfect viral template.  

In a music industry landscape where having a song catch on TikTok is a mandatory step to scoring a hit, artists and A&Rs alike are incentivized to deliver contrasts in look and style that cut through. Amidst industry discussion about rap’s declining market share and country’s boom, both genres remain a dominant force on the charts and, if the success of “All The Way” and other country rap collabs in recent years is any indication, listeners are hungry for more crossover. Still, as the hitmaking template gets more established — Lil Durk and Morgan Wallen have collaborated twice in the last four years, while BigX released a new single with country rapper Shaboozey in June — the formula has to stay fresh to keep working. 

Seven years on from “Old Town Road,” country rap hits are far from anomalies. As the lines between genres continue to blur — and, with them,  the lines between respective fanbases — the country rap template continues to be a proven outlet for crossover success.