BigXthaPlug Wants Rap To Be Fun Again As He Questions Drill’s Influence

BigXthaPlug has a blunt diagnosis for the state of rap: the music has lost some of its fun, and the pressure to look tough has narrowed what artists think they can make.

The Dallas rapper laid out that argument during a Club Shay Shay conversation with Shannon Sharpe. He answered quickly when Sharpe asked whether rap was dying, then pointed to his own fast rise as evidence that the system is moving strangely.

“I been rapping five years. Ain’t no way I should be at the top,” BigXthaPlug said.

His point was not that he did not earn his success. He questioned how viral records can push newcomers into the same commercial conversation as veterans who spent years building careers. In his view, money and momentum now move faster than experience.

BigXthaPlug also argued that drill music changed the mood around Hip-Hop. He did not dismiss the artists or the sound. Instead, he said its influence helped create an environment where too many rappers feel they must be aggressive, even when a different direction might fit them better.

“It need to be fun again,” he said.

He pointed to Snoop Dogg’s pop collaborations as an example of a period when major rappers could stretch without treating every crossover as a threat to their credibility. The comparison was less about nostalgia than freedom. BigXthaPlug wants artists to try records that sound unexpected and still be accepted as rappers.

That position carries extra weight because BigXthaPlug has tested Hip-Hop’s borders himself. His country-inspired project I Hope You’re Happy debuted at No. 7 on the Billboard 200, while “All The Way” with Bailey Zimmerman reached No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart.

He has since returned to rap with Better Over Time, an 18-track album featuring GloRilla, Lil Yachty, Leon Thomas, Ava Max and others. AllHipHop attended his Dallas preview, where the album was paired with a short film and a surprise parking-lot performance.

His official site now presents Better Over Time as the main event, but the music around it moves through rap, R&B and pop. That variety makes his criticism more than an outside complaint. He is testing the openness he says the genre needs.

BigXthaPlug’s answer is not a demand for one sound to replace another. He is asking for room to experiment again, whether that means country, pop, storytelling or straight Texas rap. His own career shows why he believes moving outside one image can expand an audience without abandoning Hip-Hop.