Playboi Carti

About

Jordan Terrell Carter, known by his stage name Playboi Carti and the nickname King Vamp, is an Atlanta-based rapper and hip-hop artist who came to prominence in the late 2010s amid his inclusion in the 2017 XXL Freshman Class and his then-recent self-titled album. Since then, Carti has garnered a mass following, becoming a household name going into the 2020s. Playboi Carti memes are prevalent online, across platforms like Twitter and TikTok, among other websites like Reddit where the /r/playboicarti subreddit has become notable for its shitposting. His songs have inspired many TikTok sounds and have been used as the audio for multiple viral video trends. In 2019, Carti started the record label Opium, signing other rappers with similar dark "vamp" aesthetics like Ken Carson and Destroy Lonely.

Background

Jordan Terrell Carter was born on September 13th, 1996, in Riverdale, Georgia, U.S.^[1] When he was growing up, he wanted to be an NBA player, but also rapped in his free time. Around the time that he was making his debut album Playboi Carti, he was close to failing high school and was working at an H&M store.^[1]

Musical History

Carti uploaded his first songs to Soundcloud in 2011.^[2] In 2014, he joined Awful Records when Atlanta rapper Father was restructuring the label.^[3] Carti later moved to New York City where he met members of A$AP Mob like A$AP Rocky and later moved to Texas to join their group.^[4] On October 1st, 2015, he uploaded the music video for his single "Broke Boi" to YouTube, where over the course of seven years, it received roughly 17.5 million views (shown below). The song was one of Carti's first hit singles alongside "Fetti."

From late 2015 to early 2017, Carti collaborated with more up-and-coming rappers in the Atlanta scene such as UnoTheActivist, Thouxanbanfauni, Yung Bans and Lil Yachty. In 2016, he started touring with A$AP Ferg and Lil Uzi Vert, the latter of which became one of his core collaborators. On April 13th, 2017, Carti released his self-titled album Playboi Carti.^[5] The notoriety of the album landed him a spot within the 2017 XXL Freshman Class, alongside others like XXXTentacion, Ugly God and Lil Pump.

Carti's prominence continued to grow going into the late 2010s. On May 11th, 2018, he released his second album Die Lit.^[6] On December 25th, 2020, Carti released his third album Whole Lotta Red.^[7]

Online Presence

On Instagram

Playboi Carti's online presence started on Instagram sometime in 2014. The first time Carti's Instagram was saved to the Internet Archive^[8] was on January 6th, 2015, when he had 518 followers. His first still-visible post was made on October 20th, 2014. On March 25th, 2018, his Instagram was saved again to the Internet Archive,^[9] where at the time, he had amassed roughly 2.9 million followers.

/r/playboicarti Subreddit

The /r/playboicarti^[10] subreddit was created on July 27th, 2016, and over the course of six years, it amassed roughly 377,000 members. Its most-upvoted post^[11] of all-time was uploaded by Redditor mahoney4321 on January 2nd, 2021, and showed an Instagram DM screenshot between them and Carti in which they'd allegedly beat Carti at emoji ping-pong. The post received roughly 31,600 upvotes in a year and a half (shown below).

Additionally, the /r/playboicarti subreddit garnered a reputation across social media for being objectively strange and fostering a strange array of members. For instance, on April 23rd, 2022, Twitter^[12] user spaceeong tweeted a screenshot of an /r/playboicarti post that he labeled as cringe, gaining roughly 106,100 likes in six months (shown below, left). On September 22nd, 2022, the Twitter^[13] account HipHopMoments_ posted a screenshot of a Redditor that thought a swastika as a profile picture, "looks hard," gaining roughly 114,900 likes in one month (shown below, right).

Related Memes

My Stummy Hurt

My Stummy Hurt is a Playboi Carti lyric in his song "Cancun." After the song was released online, fans made parody videos and image macros about the lyric, as well as a video of the rapper rubbing money on his stomach while the lyric plays.

Playboi Carti's "Kid Cudi" / "Pissy Pamper"

Playboi Carti's 'Kid Cudi' refers to the rap song "Pissy Pamper" by Young Nudy and Pi'erre Bourne featuring Playboi Carti. A snippet of the song containing Playboi Carti's feature, leaked in March 2019, gained significant popularity in video edits on Instagram, also spreading to Twitter and TikTok.

Phrog

Phrog refers to a video of a bullfrog sitting on an edge of a bench in an upright, human-like pose. In April 2019, the video gained popularity on Instagram following a popular edit in which the footage combined with the song with "Kid Cudi" ("Pissy Pamper") by Playboi Carti, with the trend later expanding to include similar videos of frogs.

Almost cried watching this shit😭‼️💯💯 pic.twitter.com/KvHUc0eCIw

— iG: bloutgoggles (bloutgoggles) April 12, 2019

They Tryna Be

They Tryna Be is a misheard lyric from the unreleased song "Pissy Pamper / Kid Cudi" by Playboy Carti. After the track was leaked online, several people made jokes trying to decipher the hook of the song, which sounds like it could be "They Tryna Be Cray" but could also be more nonsensical things like "They Tryna Be Crepe" and "They Tryna Be Crate."

Die Lit Album Cover Parodies

Die Lit Album Cover Parodies are parodies of the album cover for Playboi Carti's Die Lit, depicting Carti stage diving into a crowd of punks in black-and-white. The album was released in May 2018 and the album cover became the subject of photoshop parodies that month, often replacing Carti diving with another person or character or placing him in another situation. In 2021, people began making Bro Think He Carti video edits where characters flip in the air, followed by the image being edited into the album cover.

Bro Think He Carti

[W.I.P.]

Wake Up Filthy

Wake Up Filthy or Wake Up F1lthy refers to the producer tag for music producer and engineer F1lthy. The tag starts with a beeping sound followed by a soft British woman's voice saying, "wake up Filthy" and can be heard in songs with beats produced by F1lthy, including songs by artists like Playboi Carti, Bladee and Matt Ox. The tag became the subject of memes in 2020, inspiring a viral sound on TikTok in 2022.

Standing Goat

Standing Goat, also known as PlayBoi Carti Goat, refers to a series of memes revolving around a white taxidermy goat created to appear standing upright. The goat was made by Adele Morse in 2018, who also created Stoned Fox, but began seeing use in memes around 2019 due to its unsettling nature, blank expression and odd features, typically in the form of image macros.

On May 26th, 2019, the earliest known example of the PlayBoi Carti Goat variant of the meme was uploaded by YouTuber^[14] southcoastghost with Playboi Carti’s song "Pissy Pamper," receiving over 96,500 views in roughly two years (shown below).

King Vamp / Vamps

In late 2021, Carti embarked on his then-recent "King Vamp Tour" in accordance with the release of Whole Lotta Red in 2020 which was vampire themed. Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, his tour was postponed until late 2021. Thereafter, Carti's fans dubbed themselves "vamps."

King Vamp King Vamp pic.twitter.com/BrZmn7NIje

— ✞ (@GUNNERSELLWHITE) December 24, 2021

Search Interest

External References