YL

With his tough-as-nails rhymes about city life, French rapper Yamine L'artiste (a.k.a. YL) has been capturing the spirit of his Marseille hometown since joining the Click 11.43 group in 2007. After rolling with the crew for nearly a decade and honing his freestyle game during events in the city, YL (born on April 6, 1996 in Metz, France) gained notoriety as a solo artist in 2016 when his "Traficante" track was used to soundtrack Tunisian-born French director Kharm Dridi's movie set in the drug-ravaged outer suburbs of Marseille, Chouf. He scored a deal with Def Jam the following year and fed the appetite for hardcore beats and flow across a stream of singles, dropping his guest-streaked debut mixtape, Confidences, in 2018 and tipping the scales towards commercial success with the release peaking at Number 2 in France. Nyx & Erebe / Aether & Hemer followed in 2019, with guest features from Timal and Niro once again helping to expand his sound, and 2020 marked the double whammy release of Vaillants – which was steered in part by his fans who were able to take part in the artistic direction via Instagram Live – and Compte de Faits. Yamine (2022), his fifth studio effort, climbed to Number 27 on the French Albums Chart and featured cameos by ISK, Sasso, and Kofs.