Often credited for bringing cloud rap back to life, Virginia rapper and producer smokedope2016 stands out as a visionary. His music has a dreamy and nostalgic vibe, making him one of a kind.

Little is known about smokedope2016’s personal life, who seemingly prefers to keep his public and private lives separate, rarely sharing details and often blurring his face in videos, social media posts, and album covers. As he told the Masked Gorilla podcast in February 2025, he had traded his welding job for a full-time music career in summer 2024. Despite this information, fan speculation, on Reddit particularly, is very common, with people often trying to figure out more details about his personal life.

Thanks to his 2022 breakout single “IM NOT GOD BUT I WISH I WAS”“ – which featured Joeyy (a member of Shed Theory, a rap collective he often collaborates with), and which reached 4 million streams on Spotify within four months – a fanbase started forming around smokedope2016. His later projects, such as THE COMEUP and THE PEAK, gained a lot of attention in the underground scene, and songs like “White Owls” and “2016”, featuring Laker, quickly reached the million stream mark.

smokedope2016’s musical style has often been compared to Black Kray, Acid Souljah, and Lil B, all artists known for their experimental, ambient sounds that shape the underground cloud rap scene. In his appearance on the aforementioned Masked Gorilla podcast, he explained that experimentation is necessary to grow artistically, which is crucial for any artist’s longevity: an idea that is truly reflected in his discography.