Pop Smoke’s debut album is bringing in record success after it went two times platinum in less than five months.
The 20-year old deceased rapper was shot and killed in a home invasion in February after four masked gunmen broke into his house. Four persons were charged for the killing, and two are facing the death penalty if convicted.
However, Pop Smoke’s legacy lives on as his album sales soar. His album ‘Shoot for the Stars Aim for the Moon’ was his debut album. He is also among the only three rappers to go multi-platinum in 2020 behind Roddy Ricch’s Please excuse me for being Antisocial and Lil Baby’s My Turn.
Shoot for the stars aim for the Moon debuted in the top 5 on Billboard 200. The album continues to be in the top 5 for the last five months. Songs on the album also made the Billboard Year End Hot 100 chart-; Mood Swings’, ‘Dior,’ ‘For the night’ featuring Lil Baby and DaBaby and ‘The Woo.’ The first three songs have been certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America.
The young rapper earned his first Grammy nomination with”Dior” in the Best Rap Song category. However, his team felt that he should have been nominated in multiple categories of the Grammy, including Best New Artist.
Pop Smoke manager Steven Victor said the artist deserved to be recognized for his contributions to Drill music. “No disrespect, but who is D Smoke? This is an artist- I’m not saying he started a genre because he didn’t start drill music – but [Pop] bought drill music to the forefront and made it mainstream. He had a huge impact. Forget about whether he passed away, his impact was felt way before that.”
