A timeline of Juice Jam headliner Jack Harlow’s rise to prominence
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Jack Harlow’s rise into the mainstream may look like the familiar story of an industry plant, but stardom didn’t come overnight for the Louisville native. The Kentucky rapper has been working to break into the rap game since he was 12 years old, and when he finally arrived on the scene, he brought with him his bashful charm and quirky off-beat humor. Harlow will headline Juice Jam this Sunday, so before spending $25 on the festival ticket, here’s a timeline of his rise to fame.
2012: First online rap videos
Before he released his first EP, Harlow was already recording music videos, one-off freestyles and remixes on YouTube and SoundCloud. His come-up is recorded in videos that can be described as 2010s-core, so they will resonate with SU’s current classes. Harlow spent the early years of this decade remixing and rapping on songs like “Drop It Like It’s Hot” and “Beez in the Trap” in YouTube videos that unashamedly feature his childhood bedroom’s pale green walls and twin size bed as a backdrop, juxtaposed against Harlow’s pop filter and microphone.
2013: Toilet seat freestyle
This is just a video everyone should see. This early music video from the archives showcases Harlow’s goofiness and sense of humor. From his awkward flirtations with online comedian Druski to his weekly Instagram stories where he answers very personal questions from fans with joking answers, Harlow has a class clown-adjacent sense of humor that old videos prove has been in the works since he was in high school.
2014: “Finally Handsome”
The rapper’s first EP under his current name is no longer available on streaming services because Harlow worried it would tarnish his reputation once he made it mainstream. Before “Finally Handsome,” he went by Mr. Harlow and sometimes Handsome Harlow, but, as Harlow told Louisville.com in a 2017 profile, “My brand is being true to myself.” So, Harlow ended up re-adopting his full name for all future albums.
2017: “Dark Knight”
After multiple record deals fell through during his high school years, Harlow released his two post high school albums under his and his friends’ own label, Private Garden. Finally in 2018, Harlow signed to DJ Drama and Don Cannon’s Generation Now label, under Atlantic Records, after his breakthrough single “Dark Knight” off of his 2017 album “Gazebo.”
2018: “SUNDOWN”
Harlow’s song “SUNDOWN” off “Loose,” his first album with Generation Now, brought the Kentucky rapper into the spotlight for good. Genius recorded a Verified video with him where he breaks down the lyrics to the song, and, in classic Harlow fashion, opens the video with a drawn-out, self deprecating joke regarding a “big d*ck” line in the song. The Jack Harlow in this video sounds the same as the one shown in more current interviews at the Grammys and MTV Video Music Awards, but he looks different. He sports an awkward Coogi button up as opposed to the silk shirts and sweaters he wears in more recent interviews.
January 2020: “WHATS POPPIN”
Jack Harlow started out 2020 running, with “WHATS POPPIN” jumping off of his album “Sweet Action” straight into TikTok videos, accumulating over 300,000 glow-up videos that used his song as audio. It wasn’t over then, though – in June of that year Harlow released the remix of the song and a video with DaBaby, Tory Lanez and Lil Wayne. The song was Harlow’s first number one on Billboard’s Rhythmic Songs chart, and Vulture magazine called it the song of the summer.
August 2020: XXL Freshman
In August of 2020, Harlow joined the 2020 XXL Freshman class. He stood his own against classmates Polo G and Baby Keem in the freestyles and cyphers because he didn’t shy away from including in his raps the serious topics that defined the summer of 2020. He rapped about police brutality in his hometown of Louisville where law enforcement officers killed David McAtee, the owner of a barbecue stand, two months earlier.
December 2020: “Thats What They All Say”
Harlow rounded out 2020 with another album that showed a huge leap from “Sweet Action.” “Thats What They All Say” is packed with Louisville references and features from Louisville artists EST Gee and Bryson Tiller alongside those from hip-hop and R&B veterans including Big Sean, Lil Baby and Chris Brown.
2021: Grammy Nomination
“WHATS POPPIN” got nominated for best rap performance at the 2021 Grammys. Though he didn’t take home the award, it was still a big moment for Harlow, who said he hadn’t expected his first big song to yield such results. He told the Recording Academy, “I’d always dreamed of getting a nomination, but I didn’t think it would come this early in my career.”
2021 August: “Industry Baby”
Harlow said he had admired Lil Nas X long before he hopped on his song “INDUSTRY BABY.” The two share a light-hearted approach to social media — Harlow more on Instagram, Lil Nas X on Twitter — and Harlow told Variety he was more than enthusiastic about working with him. He said he had no qualms when it came time to be in the music video, and if Lil Nas X had asked, he would have even been in the naked shower scene. The song went number one on the Billboard chart for streamed songs, and the duo performed it at the VMAs in September.
Harlow has come a long way, from music videos filmed in the halls of his high school to some of the biggest stages in music, and now to Syracuse’s Juice Jam stage this Sunday. But as he raps in “INDUSTRY BABY,” he’s still got a long way to go: “I didn’t peak in high school, I’m still out here getting cuter.”