Dallas rapper BigXthaPlug came up as a regional underground rapper. He’s not that anymore. BigX has been rapping since the late ’00s, and he’s been on this website’s radar since 2022, when his twangy home-state anthem “Texas” made our songs-of-the-week countdown. BigX’s country rap tunes effortlessly absorb actual country music into their slow-crawl Southern rap swamp, which makes him a figure uniquely suited to this moment. In his Pitchfork piece on the first Coachella weekend, Paul A. Thompson opens with a scene of BigX performing in an overflowing tent with a too-low mic — a sure sign that someone is exploding in popularity. Sure enough, BigX now has a top-10 hit and a late-night TV performance under his belt.
