T-Pain

If you're wondering why Kanye West sounds like a Daft Punk understudy on his album 808s & Heartbreak, the answer lies in one of his admitted muses, T-Pain. The pair first crossed paths on the GRAMMY®-winning "Good Life," a perfect pitch-shifting example of why T-Pain keeps popping up on key hip-hop and R&B singles, from his own chart-climbing cuts (the sly, lifted lyrics — 50 Cent, Lil Jon, Lil Scrappy — of "Buy U a Drank," the shimmering synths and finger-snap beats of "Can't Believe It") to such dance floor-decimating collabs as "Kiss Kiss," "Got Money," and "Low," a T-Pain production that shows him in rare, vocoder-free form.

Since we've barely scratched the surface of T-Pain's post-Top 40 reach, our Next Steps delivers more of his starring and supporting roles.

Vocoder-channeling vocals aren't the only thing that's made T-Pain an unparalleled character on par with one of his closest collaborators, Lil Wayne. While Wayne uses deft wordplay to leave our heads spinning, T-Pain strings together concepts that mirror his flashy costume changes. Thr33 Ringz is the most glaring example of this ear-grabbing approach, using his "Ringleader Man" persona as the springboard for a variety show costarring Kanye West (the restless, crisscrossing loops of "Therapy"), Ludacris (the robotic, Dirty South nods of "Chopped N Skrewed"), and a rotating cast of other chart-toppers.

Career-skimming solo songs aside, our Deep Cuts also dips into pass-the-mic sessions with Rick Ross, T.I., and more.

With a sound beamed straight from outer space and a title that's a twist on the phrase rapper turned singer, T-Pain's 2005 debut, Rappa Ternt Sanga, unveiled the producer/performer's self-proclaimed "Hard & B" stance to the tune of heat-seeking hooks ("Ur Not the Same") and speaker-battering basslines ("Blow Ya Mind"). In the years since, he's perfected the art of being a smooth operator amid 8-bit blips and beeps ("Go Home With You"), trigger-happy percussion ("Go Hard"), steady piano stabs and live drums ("Sounds Bad"), and a melting pot of gunshots, ghostly choirs, and steely synths torn straight from the hardcore hip-hop handbook ("Creep Fast").

Picking up where Kraftwerk and Afrika Bambaataa left off, T-Pain has used the virtues of the vocoder to become one of the most recognizable voices in hip-hop, R&B, and pop. Whether you realize it or not, his stamp has been all over the charts since 2005, when he sealed a record deal with Akon's Konvict Muzik label — a deal that's resulted in three solo albums that have sold millions of copies, as well as repeat performances alongside such arena-packing artists as R. Kelly, Bow Wow, Chris Brown, Rick Ross, Twista, and Akon himself. As if all that weren't already enough, T-Pain's also a proven producer, dishing out laser-like melodies and airtight beats for Lil Wayne ("Got Money"), Ciara ("Go Girl"), and up-and-comers like Dolla ("Who the F*** Is That?").