For years, the relatable Michigan rapper's lore was missing a crucial component: an album. In the lead up to its release, he talked leak culture, becoming a talk-show host and his idea of taste.

The unwritten rules of rap unpacked in Louder's second season are held together by a scarcity principle that came to define the show itself. As it draws to a close, the team reflects on its mission.

In 2016, a rift between hitmakers showed the limits of rap's tolerance for rule-breakers. As Mark Anthony Neal explains, "authentic" Black masculinity has always been a moving target in hip-hop.

Not everyone who was part of rap's ascent gets included in its story. MC Sha-Rock, of the original Funky 4 and the Funky 4 + 1, reaffirms her role in hip-hop's formative years as the first woman MC.

Already a quiet influence on the hyperpop scene, fame, relationships, stimulants and screens collide in brakence's "realer-than-real" sound.

In this week's Heat Check selects, prodigies past and present connect with OGs and friends, rappers stretch the limits of genre, young artists breathe new life into unmistakable samples and more.

This week's Heat Check selects feature an R&B newbie enlisting a legend, a spaced-out rapper deciding to go it alone, artists from Compton, London and Nigeria refusing complacency and more.

LIL YACHTY: "You recording?"
ENGINEER: "Yep."
LIL YACHTY: "I TOOK THE WOOOOOOOOCK TO POLAND!"
F1LTHY: "What the hell was that??"
ENGINEER: "Do you wanna try that again?"
LIL YACHTY: "Nah trust me."

This week's Heat Check selects come largely from iconoclasts who have already zeroed in on their individual aesthetics: a singsong rap soulman, an alté sensation a noise-rap radical and more.

This week's Heat Check playlist gathers artists from across the spectrum: a grime king retaking his throne, Cardi B signal boosting the summer's most exciting newcomer, risers and covert stars.

The murder of two journalists in Tijuana in less than a week has shocked reporters there and sparked outrage nationwide.

Three journalist have been killed in Mexico this year, two of them occurring in Tijuana. NPR's Asma Khalid talks with 'Tijuana Press' editor Vicente Calderón about the city's pattern of violence.

French fashion designer Thierry Mugler reshaped the fashion world, centering wildly inventive concepts and creating space for queer voices. On Sunday, he died at the age of 73.

Some of the oldest human remains ever unearthed are the Omo 1 bones found in Ethiopia. For decades, their precise age has been debated, but a new study may have the answer.

NPR's Ailsa Chang talks with Matthew Cortland, senior fellow at Data For Progress, who was present at Friday's meeting between disability rights advocates and CDC director Rochelle Walensky.

Some of the oldest human remains ever unearthed are the Omo One bones found in Ethiopia. For decades, their precise age has been debated, but a new study argues they're around 233,000 years old.

Looking back, countdowns weren't always good news. Think atomic bomb tests. Americans also counted down moon missions and Top 40 hits. It wasn't until 1979 that a Times Square crowd joined in.

These days, a New Year's Eve celebration doesn't feel complete without one thing: a countdown. But that ritual to ring in the new year isn't as old as you might think.

NPR's Mary Louise Kelly talks with Evan Osnos of The New Yorker about radio host Dan Bongino, who calls masks "face diapers," opposes vaccine mandates and says the 2016 and 2020 elections were rigged.

In 2017, the rapper Logic named a song after the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline phone number. A new study has found it may have had a remarkable impact.