OutKast — "B.O.B (Bombs Over Baghdad)"
Stankonia's impossible lead single—drum'n'bass breakbeats, wailing guitar, organ, gospel choir—that radio was too scared to play in 2000. The song critics eventually crowned the decade's best.
#Atlanta
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"Iesha" — Another Bad Creation
Six boys between seven and twelve rapping about a playground crush over a Dallas Austin beat, the 1990 single that made Another Bad Creation the kid act of the New Jack Swing era. Michael Bivins found them, Motown signed them, and it went top ten.
Kris Kross
Two Atlanta kids in backwards clothes spent eight weeks at No. 1 with "Jump" — at 13, charting at an age no hip-hop group had matched. For one glorious stretch of 1992, half the playgrounds in America turned their jeans around.
Lil Jon
Crunk's king — jeweled goblet, dark shades, dreads, and a three-word vocabulary delivered at maximum volume. Jonathan Smith came up through Atlanta's rap scene and spent the mid-2000s making the loudest, most fun records on the radio. He didn't just ride the decade; he supplied its energy.
Ludacris
"Move" (the radio edit) and "Stand Up" turned an Atlanta radio DJ into the loudest voice of the Dirty South. Ludacris rapped like a cartoon with perfect timing, lost a Pepsi deal after Bill O'Reilly called for a boycott, and then became Tej in the Fast & Furious movies.
"Lullaby" — Shawn Mullins
A half-spoken verse about a sad rich girl in the Hollywood Hills, then a hook that promised everything's gonna be all right, rock-a-bye. Shawn Mullins had spent a decade selling his own cassettes at shows when "Lullaby" went to number seven in the first weeks of 1999.
OutKast
André 3000 and Big Boi met as teenagers at Lenox Square mall in Atlanta and launched one of hip-hop's most fearless acts. The South got something to say—literally—and hip-hop would never ignore it again.
OutKast — "So Fresh, So Clean"
OutKast's getting-dressed anthem and cultural forever-favorite. A Sleepy Brown hook over a Joe Simon soul sample that became the decade's smoothest flex. The video was a visual extravaganza—CGI backdrops, a beauty parlor, church scenes, and cameos from Ludacris, Chilli, and Goodie Mob.
TLC
The best-selling American girl group since the Supremes. T-Boz, Left Eye, and Chilli fused hip-hop, R&B, and a playful safe-sex message into era-defining hits — "Waterfalls," "No Scrubs," "Creep" — in baggy streetwear that a generation copied.