Do we like Rich Brian?
Our score: 8 out of 10. Early missteps as a teen, apologised for, and no harmful pattern or bad-boss stories since, plus some real pandemic-era good.
Brian Imanuel grew up in Jakarta and taught himself English from the internet. He has said he was the only kid he knew in Indonesia who spoke it, and that he was obsessed with getting to America from about 13. That bedroom-YouTube education is the whole origin story of a rapper who went global at 16.
The first big stoush was his original stage name, a pun built on a racial slur, which blew up alongside his viral debut. At the start of 2018 he dropped it and wrote that he was “naive” and had “made a mistake”. He later told Complex he realised how offensive it was and that it hadn't represented him for a long time.
Then, in 2020, tweets he wrote around age 13 resurfaced, and he copped backlash. BroBible's write-up didn't carry a response from him, and its author argued that people were judging a thirteen-year-old who'd learned English from rap videos. Where you land depends on whether you think a teen's tweets should follow someone for years, but it's a stain from childhood, not a pattern.
On the harm check, we found nothing from him as an adult: no campaigning against LGBTQ+ or trans people, no conspiracy-theory slide, no anti-vax or climate-denial material. That's a thin record, and he's an artist who mostly talks about music and growing up. His 2025 album credits guests like Toro y Moi and Ski Mask The Slump God, and none of that company raised red flags.
Nothing new on him lately beyond the music. His album WHERE IS MY HEAD? came out in August 2025, his first full album in six years, and the tour wrapped in Los Angeles in March 2026. Reviewers noted he apologised to fans for a venue change and held the doors so latecomers could get in.
The good stuff is real. In 2020 he put out an Indonesian version of his Bali video that pointed fans to a crowdfunding campaign for Indonesian daily workers hit by the pandemic. He also helped open doors for Asian artists in hip-hop, though we haven't verified specifics beyond that.