Having firmly established himself as one of hip-hop’s rising stars, American rapper Yeat, real name Noah Smith, released two albums in 2024 to commercial success. The first of which, 2093, repositioned Yeat’s signature sound in a cinematic and futuristic landscape, and the second album, Lyfestyle, became Yeat’s first Billboard 200-topping release.
Fresh off the release of his first 2025 single “The Bell”, here are a few things you should know about Yeat:
Yeat has been around since 2018
While he himself teases he’s been making music since at least 2016, Smith’s oldest release under the Yeat nomenclature was a song titled “Brink” to the YouTube channel Elevator in 2018. It showcased the foundations of his murky, artificial, slurred aesthetic but was very much still an example of an 18 year old finding his footing.
Yeat has released 15 different projects
Since coming onto the scene, Yeat has been incredibly active in feeding his fanbase with new material. Deep Blue Strips was his first release in 2018, a short EP, and included the previously mentioned “Brink.” A proper mixtape and EP followed in 2019, another mixtape and two EPs in 2020, and two more mixtapes and an EP before finally releasing his debut album in 2021, titled “Up 2 Më.” Yeat has showed no signs of slowing down with another album, “2 Alivë,” and a rather lengthy EP “Lyfë” dropping in 2022, before dropping his third studio album “AftërLyfe” in 2023. His 2024 releases round out his discography and mark a shift to full-length work.
Yeat did a song for a Minions movie
Upon signing to a major record label, artists will look at various avenues to further their reach, so it is unsurprising to learn that Yeat provided a promotional single for a major motion picture. What is most surprising, is that the song he made alongside producer Lotto was for the 2022 almost billion-dollar-grossing animated family film Minions: Rise of Gru. The song, “Rich Minion,” received a music video with the popular Lyrical Lemonade music video channel/production team headed by Cole Bennett, but was unfortunately not featured in the movie’s official soundtrack.
Yeat is already self-mythologised
Yeat’s fashion style has been memed with teenagers dressing up in his signature balaclava mixed with streetwear look. Most of the funniness comes from Yeat being a white-passing American in the dominantly Black American and Black British genre and his white fans now feeling validated wearing looks from a culture they have little representation in. Aside from visuals, his post-2020 music has been stylistically consistent with frequent usage of bells and using slang words like “tonka” and “twizzy” to the point where you couldn’t go two songs in a row without hearing at least one of those things. After his feature on Drake’s “IDGAF,” a song already memed for Drake’s adlibbing “money for fun,” Yeat released a song titled “Get Busy,” on which he addressed his bell obsession with the line: “Yeah, this song already was turnt but here’s a bell,” making us laugh and somehow taking the song to another level.
Drake, Lil Wayne, and Childish Gambino have all worked with Yeat
As mentioned earlier, Drake and Yeat collaborated on a song titled “IDGAF” from Drake’s For All The Dogs. The song alongside a few others on the album sees Drake experimenting with rage music, the Playboi Carti and Lil Uzi Vert microgenre of the trap subgenre of rap music. Even though it is Drake’s song, he steps aside and gives Yeat the primary focus, leaving him to do the hook and giving a verse. The song went to number two on the Billboard Hot 100, Yeat’s first to do so. Their collaborative effort has also produced “As We Speak,” a song from the deluxe release of Yeat’s 2093 album. On the original version and included in the deluxe, Lil Wayne gave a feature performance on “Lyfestyle”—not to be confused with his album of the same name. Future was also present on “Stand on It.” Finally, 2024 also included a feature for Yeat on Childish Gambino’s “Cruisin’” from Gambino’s final album “Bando Stone & the New World,” with Gambino returning the favour with some background vocals on 2093.
Yeat is now a Coachella-level artist
Yeat debuted his recent single “The Bell” during his set at the 2025 Coachella festival in the Californian and Colorado desert heat. This marks the first time he has performed a set at the festival and there was never going to be a better time to set the tone of what’s to come. The single features a falsetto on the hook, showcasing Yeat’s versatile nature. He also covered the Drake song “Feel No Ways” during the set. The performance comes in a year where Yeat is also set to headline the 2025 Summer Smash Festival alongside Young Thug and Don Toliver.
There is a lot more to come
Yeat has already teased an album for the upcoming year titled “A Dangerous Lyfe” presumably featuring another umlaut over the E. Whether that is a return to the comparatively up tempo style found on Up 2 Me or a continuation of the falsettos found on “The Bell,” Yeat has been on record saying he has a lot of material to work with. In an interview for The Fader, he was working with something in the realm of 4,800 beats for Lyfestyle so we know he could be selecting from a similar range for A Dangerous Lyfe. Factoring in the whispers of a collaborative album with Don Toliver, a historically quick turnaround time, and his very recent act of debuting music at live festivals, we can expect to hear more from Yeat soon. Stay tuned.
