Congratulations to Latto on reaching a new milestone by surpassing 1 billion streams of her music on Spotify. The 24-year-old has had a successful year touring with Lizzo, performing at Coachella and other major festivals — which may have led to listeners streaming her music.

Latto’s streaming success has fans questioning why it took so long for her to achieve this level of success. She has long proven to be a strong lyricist since she was 16 on the hit show The Rap Game.

In 2016, The Rap Game, created by Jermaine Dupri, followed several teens as they pursued securing a one-time opportunity with So So Def. Latto was one of the young heavy hitters on the show, but her story with Dupri ended there.

“People keep always saying, Jermaine, you dropped the ball on [Latto]. But what people don’t understand is I put Latto’s record out. The deal was, if you win on The Rap Game, you get a single from Jermaine Dupri on So So Def. So that single came out,” he told HipHopDX

“The problem was that Latto was 16 years old, and the outlets didn’t support it. And nobody was like speaking on it. Nobody talked about it. If you watched the TV show, you saw it,” he continued. “But people didn’t start talking about Latto until she started making more vulgar records, dressing more sexually, and being more adult.”

Being a vetted songwriter and producer, Dupri’s observations serve right — Latto’s vulgar lyrics, fly outfits and sex appeal have elevated her tremendously.

Do you think Latto would have had the same success if Dupri would’ve kept her in his back pocket until she was of age?

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