NEW YORK, NY - APRIL 09: 2 Chainz visits BET’s 106 & Park on April 9, 2012 in New York, United States. (Photo by Robin Marchant/FilmMagic)
Photo: Robin Marchant/2012 Robin Marchant
We’ll never know if it was the fact that 2 Chainz made himself impossibly visible by teaming with Kanye West, Nicki Minaj, Drake, and basically everyone else in 2012, or if it all came down to that one time he said “okay now ketchup to my campaign / coupe the color of mayonnaise†on “Mercy,†but the 35-year-old rapper is on pace to land Billboard’s No. 1 spot, moving 130,000 copies of his debut, Based on a T.R.U. Story. That’s only 20,000 fewer than Nas’s excellent eleventh album, Life Is Good. Whoa, 2 Chainz. Whoa.