Introducing the King of Hip-Hop

Now more than three decades old as a recorded medium, hip-hop is deeply embedded in popular culture – to the point where its stars seem not only larger than life but also, as Rick Ross once put it, "deeper than rap." But even as they sell out arenas and top the pop charts, rappers still court the respect and esteem of their hip-hop peers. The title King of Hip-Hop still means something.

In that spirit, just as we did in June with the Queen of Pop, we've crunched a pile of data to try to determine who is the current King of Hip-Hop.

We're not looking for the all-time greatest, although many of our contenders would vie for that crown. Some of them have only been recording a couple of years; others have been in the game since the 1990s. But that's what makes hip-hop exciting – it's plausible for someone who was watching cartoons when Jay-Z dropped his debut album to emerge as a contender for the title.

As with our Queen of Pop tally, in naming the King of Hip-Hop we focused on the very recent past: from 2009 through the first seven months of 2011. We ranked 20 solo rappers (no groups – sorry, Beasties) who have dropped an album during that time. We looked at album sales, rankings on the R&B/hip-hop and rap charts, YouTube views, social media, concert grosses, industry awards and critics' ratings. In alphabetical order, our contenders are: Big Boi, B.o.B, Diddy, Drake, Eminem, Fabolous, Lupe Fiasco, Gucci Mane, Jay-Z, Kid Cudi, Lil Wayne, Ludacris, Nicki Minaj, Pitbull, Rick Ross, Snoop Dogg, T.I., Waka Flocka Flame, Kanye West and Wiz Khalifa.

All of our contenders are men except for Minaj, who reappears from our Queen of Pop survey. We like to think of "King" as a gender-neutral term, and the fact is that Minaj has earned the right to compete in this arena. It would feel strange to leave her out – as a rapper, she's had a world-beating couple of years, with a chart-topping album, block-rocking singles and a slew of killer guest appearances. Frankly, she deserves to be called a hip-hop king just for her giant-killing appearance on West's hit "Monster," in which she crushed West and fellow guests Rick Ross and Jay-Z with one blow.

Fans of the rappers, and the acts themselves, take these sorts of rankings pretty seriously. (We learned that firsthand in the comments section of Queens of Pop.) We stand by our data, but of course we know that no King of Hip-Hop index can capture swagger or flow – if it could, the all-time title might go to Q-Tip or Rakim. As you'll see, it turned out to be a fairly exciting contest. Our top overall contenders were pretty evenly matched, with five different rappers leading at least one tally each.

Let's start with the tally that comes with the biggest bragging rights: album sales.

9 pages of FACTS By ---> Rolling Stone

Big Boi Hopes To Reunite With Dre

Outkast fans hoping to hear Andre 3000 and Big Boi trade bars again may not have to wait too long. While there are rumors of an Outkast project being released sometime in 2012, Big Boi says that he thinks chances are good that Three-Stacks could make an appearance on Big Boi's upcoming sophomore album.

Label politics kept 3000 off of Big Boi's 2010 album Sir Lucious Left Foot..., but now that L.A. Reid is chairman of Epic, Big Boi believes the reins could be loosened a bit and the former partners could share a song on his upcoming album, Daddy Fat Sax.

"I think it's very much possible because we have L.A. Reid in our corner now, and he was the first to sign Outkast," Big Boi said.

Andre 3000 On Beyonce Album

The track listing for 4, the upcoming album by superstar Beyonce, has been revealed. The pop star looks to have very few guest stars on the album, among them the legendary Andre 3000.

Beyonce announced the song lineup and 3000 is the only guest star it looks like that will be on the album.

The songs appeared on Beyonce's Facebook page. 3000 will appear on a song called "Party." On 2003s Dangerously in Love, Bey collaborated with Big Boi on the track “Hip-Hop Star."

Big Boi On His Solo Career

Fans may have a lot longer to wait for new Outkast material, but the more prolific half of the legendary duo is hard at work on new projects. Despite recently promising both an Outkast and an Andre 3000 solo album in the same year, Big Boi dodged staking any claims in regards to if or when he and his longtime partner would be reuniting. He did, however, outlay plans for his immediate future.

“That’s top-secret information," Big Boi told the Wall Street Journal regarding Outkast's status. "So right now I’m just working on this Daddy Fat Sax album, I’m working on my new group, Vonnegut, and as well I just shot the video for my new single, “Be Still” with Janelle Monae. For the most part, it’s been about, hmm, nine years solo.”

“Before either one of them did it, I was doing it with this record,” Big Boi explained. “I put out ‘Shine Blockas’ the day after Christmas, and then came ‘For Your Sorrows’ maybe a week after that. They just put a name on it. But that was my method to releasing Sir Lucious Leftfoot—I didn’t have a record company releasing it, so I was just putting songs out like every week or two.”