Lil Wayne

CTL-E-5678 · Person · musician · 1995–present

VERIFIED evidence grade — build store (JSON graph)

Combined Graph record U-06961 · provenance: build store (JSON graph), record CTL-E-5678.

Lil Wayne (born Dwayne Michael Carter Jr. on September 27, 1982, in New Orleans, Louisiana) is the defining rapper of his generation — signed at twelve, a platinum soloist at seventeen, and the genre's center of gravity by 2008. Birdman signed him to Cash Money Records in 1995, making him the label's youngest member; he joined the Hot Boys in 1997 and broke solo with Tha Block Is Hot (1999). After Tha Carter (2004) and Tha Carter II (2005) and a relentless mixtape run, Tha Carter III (2008) sold more than a million copies in its first week, topped the Billboard 200 and won the Grammy for Best Rap Album, carried by "Lollipop" and "A Milli." Through his Young Money imprint he launched Drake and Nicki Minaj, and in August 2012 he passed Elvis Presley as the male artist with the most Billboard Hot 100 entries. CultureTechLens profiled Lil Wayne in Short #179.

The record

• Also known as: Dwayne Michael Carter Jr., Dwayne Carter

Notes

STAGED 2026-10-16 (747 Program, Shorts Reverse-Gap Wave 5) — not merged; awaits founder merge go. Gate A: no match in the live graph (3,381 entities) under exact, normalized, alias, or token-containment screening, 2026-10-16. Reverse gap: CTL Short #179 published 2026-10-14 before any entity record existed. Vital status: Living; active at staging — Tha Carter VI released 2025 (verified October 2026). Photo HELD — candidate requires file-page-level license verification. Project ID: PPL-001 per wave precedent (staged 'CULTGRAPH' ID is not registered). MEDIA LAYER (staged 2026-10-16; full per-asset PHOTO-001 records + embed specs in the packet's staged JSON, Drive packet folder): map = N/A (Person records carry no map slot under the media-layer rule; maps attach to places and institutions.) | visual_assets = HELD: No file-page-level PHOTO-001 license verification completed at staging; slot held rather than filled with an u | chart = FILLED (CTL-created SVG built only from this record's sourced facts and statistics; CTL-branded palette (black / deep ) | video = FILLED | audio = HELD (No CTL-owned or rights-cleared matching-entity audio exists at staging; the subject's own recordings and progr)

Relationships

• Cash Money Records — recorded for
  Wayne signed with Cash Money Records and was the label's flagship artist until his 2018 departure. The signing year and age are contested across opened sources and flagged on CTL-E-6294 for reconciliation; this edge does not depend on them. Grounded in Wayne's own merged record text.
• Hot Boys — related to
  Lil Wayne (CTL-E-5678) is a member of the Hot Boys, the Cash Money quartet (B.G., Lil Wayne, Juvenile, Turk) formed in 1997; his own record documents that he joined the Hot Boys in 1997, after Birdman signed him to Cash Money in 1995. Group membership is wired as related_to (Person→Person) per the batch standard, with the membership stated here in the evidence.
• Nicki Minaj — collaborated with
  Lil Wayne featured on Nicki Minaj's "High School" (2013); Minaj (CTL-E-5263) records on Wayne's Young Money imprint, which he founded in 2005.

Referenced by

• Tha Carter III — authored by → this record
• Trina — collaborated with → this record

Sources

• Wikipedia, 'Lil Wayne' — cross-checked against Billboard chart-history reporting, October 2026 (Cash Money signing, Hot Boys, Carter sequence, Young Money) (build store)
• Billboard chart history of Lil Wayne (as archived) — Tha Block Is Hot peak, Carter III first-week sales, Lollipop's five weeks at number one [primary] (primary source · build store)
• Last.fm, Lil Wayne biography — Cash Money signing at twelve; the August 2012 Hot 100 entries record (build store)
• CultureTechLens, Shorts Link Map §C catalog record, short_no 179 (CTL Short; url_status: recorded) (primary source · build store)

More person records

• Hildrus Poindexter
• Hill Harper
• Hilton Smith
• Hinton Battle
• Hiram E. Jackson
• Hiram Maxim

Browse the full directory: all entity records

Record CTL-E-5678 · Combined Graph record U-06961 · CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph · 4 sources · 5 mapped relationships.
Directory: all entity records · the knowledge graph

Researched and maintained by the CultureTechLens research program · CultureTechLens Combined Graph, Release 2026-11-04. Corrections are public: the corrections log.

Cite this record

Citation guidance for teachers, journalists, and funders: How to Cite Us.

From the Archive

The archive in pictures

The people, places, and institutions this work documents. Photographs from the CultureTechLens research record — rights-cleared, credited, and cited like everything else here.