Don Toliver is about to be everywhere. Along with Megan Thee Stallion and Travis Scott, Toliver is repping for the Texas rap scene which continues to deliver in big ways. While Scott and Megan are already household names, Toliver is not too far off with his debut album Heaven Or Hell out now after a landmark year.
It’s already been a big year for young rappers, with Roddy Ricch still holding down the top spot of the Billboard Hot 100 with The Box and Lil Mosey nabbing a viral hit with Blueberry Faygo but now Toliver is coming for his moment too. Heaven Or Hell was produced by Scott collaborator WondaGurl and was also overseen by Mike Dean, known best for his work with Kanye West.
Describing the record ahead of its release, Toliver described the title telling Sway In The Morning, “I’m a Gemini and I wanted to go about it a different way.
“The music has a lot of duality in it, a lot of different vibes...it’s up, down, here, there.”
It’s the sort of versatility that he’s been showing since the beginning, continuing rap’s long tradition of Gemini geniuses including Tupac, Kendrick Lamar, Ice Cube, Swae Lee and more.
“I believe that I have different sides, and I pick and choose which one I feel is right for the right track and right for the right mood, even in visuals,” Toliver told Complex when he dropped his last single No Idea.
His 2018 mixtape Donny Womack introduced us to his genre-shifting aesthetic. He moved from woozy, rock-inspired rap on 2 Lil Shorty to intimate, after-dark moments on Talk No More. It feels right that he got his big break with another genre-defier, appearing on Scott’s Astroworld record that dropped the same year as his mixtape.
Scott tapped Toliver to work on the record after he was introduced to his work through a mutual friend. The Texan rapper was then flown to Hawaii with a host of other collaborators including Dean to bring together the album. The result was Can’t Say, an album highlight which saw Toliver deliver the hook.
Scott signed Toliver to his growing label JACKBOYS - also home to Sheck Wes - and in the last year, he was featured on the label’s first collaborative release JACKBOYS. He had his own song on the record What To Do? as well as a collaboration with two-thirds of Migos, Offset and Quavo on Had Enough. On the latter, he once again provided a soulful hook showing that he’s making a name for himself as quite the feature.
2019 wasn’t all about the features for Toliver though. He also was making serious waves with his solo music. Before the release of JACKBOYS, he dropped No Idea. The song nabbed a strong initial response thanks to his rapidly growing fanbase but that was only the beginning. The song was adopted by TikTok users and it went viral centering around the line, “Feelin’ like I do too much.”
The song became his highest-charting solo song on the Billboard Hot 100, cracking the Top 50. The only song to go higher that he’s been involved in was Can’t Say with Scott. The song has since had close to 200 million streams on Spotify and has made him a star in his own right. It’s something that more than just Scott has noticed.
Early this year, he appeared on Eminem’s surprise-drop Music To Be Murdered By. Toliver laid down the hook for No Regrets and solidified a spot on yet another number one album - the third he’s appeared on.
“Eminem wanted me to be apart of what he had going on and I didn’t believe it. Bro sent me the vibes and the very next day it was going up,” he told Beats 1 about how it came to be.
Reportedly one of the writers and producers of the song D.A. Doman tried a number of other artists on the hook of the song but eventually settled on Toliver. He was rushed in just days before the album actually dropped.
If that’s the way he started the decade, it’s likely that it’s going to be a big one for him and 2020 is so far signaling it. On top of Heaven Or Hell and the Eminem feature, he’s also going to be touring alongside The Weeknd on his huge After Hours tour in support of his new record of the same name.
For now though, it’s all about the album. He’s pulled together a cohesive 12-set effort recruiting his JACKBOYS collaborators with Scott and Sheck Wes both featuring on the record. At only 36 minutes, it's shorter than most hip-hop albums dropping these days but it's a sign that he's confident in the strength of his songs, and he's got every reason to be.
