Rising to viral success with underground hit "Trapanese," rapper
Lil Ricefield pulled from Bay Area rap and meme culture in equal measure, producing tongue-in-cheek bangers through the start of the 2020s.
Although rapper
Lil Ricefield (born
Nathaniel Kai Oda) started making music in the mid-2010s - with early singles including "so cold" and "HO HO" - it was not until 2019 that the musician found mainstream attention, with the single "Trapanese." Combining meme-centric punchlines with a punchy flow and sure-fire confidence, the track soon found viral success online, quickly gaining tens of millions of streams across digital platforms. After closing out the year with the laid-back "Based Students," the rapper moved into 2020 with force, dropping Bay Area-inspired "Symphony" and melodic "anime shawty" before enlisting
DaBoii and
Cash Kidd for the Trapanese Remix.
Oda released his first EP,
Omakase, in November that year: leaning heavily into his Bay influences with production from
Cal-A and
P-Lo, the 6-track project mixed the tongue-in-cheek energy of the rapper's come up with new sonic directions. ~ David Crone