Machine Gun Kelly - MGK

Between Cleveland and Houston, Machine Gun Kelly, a.k.a. MGK, charts a path that links the Midwestern rap scene to songwriting shaped by alternative rock. Born Colson Baker in 1990 in Houston and settled early in Cleveland, he emerged around the turn of the 2010s with a run of mixtapes before joining Bad Boy and then Interscope in 2011. His debut studio album, Lace Up (2012), established a rapid, high‑energy rap style that blends hip‑hop, trap, and melodic hooks, a vein MGK extended on General Admission (2015) and Bloom (2017). With Hotel Diablo (2019), he leaned into a darker, introspective aesthetic where rap, emo influences, and overdriven guitars intersect, paving the way for the pop‑punk pivot of Tickets to My Downfall (2020) and Mainstream Sellout (2022), created in close collaboration with drummer‑producer Travis Barker. This shift toward rock‑ and emo‑pop‑oriented writing was accompanied by collaborations with artists from rap, pop, and the alternative scene alike, including Young Thug, Halsey, Yungblud, and Camila Cabello. Alongside his work as a musician, MGK has built a steady presence in film and television, reinforcing the image of an artist moving fluidly between hip‑hop, punk, and mainstream pop culture.