walking upstream…
Tory Lanez
photo: the come up show · cc by 2.0 ↗Tory Lanez
Born Daystar Peterson in Brampton, Ontario, Tory Lanez made his name on mixtapes that refused to sit still — the Chixtape series flipped 2000s R&B hits into his own genre-blurring "Swavey" sound, singing and rapping across the same eight bars until the line between the two blurred. His commercial peak arrived with 2016's "Luv" and the platinum I Told You, before 2021's synth-drenched Alone at Prom recast him as 1980s alter ego Ashton Rain, chasing the decade of music that raised him.
the sound in question
2016
LuvTory Lanez
walk the tributaries ↓
Chris Brown2000s · R&B / Pop / Hip hop
Lanez has named Chris Brown among the artists who shaped him growing up, and by 2019 the debt was explicit: Chixtape 5's "The Take" rebuilds itself entirely out of Brown's own 2007 hit "Take You Down," with Brown himself dropping in to trade bars over the flip.
listen: upstream & heresource: Rap-Up — Lanez discusses the Chris Brown collaboration and Lil Wayne feature on Chixtape 5 ↗
2007
Take You DownChris Brown
2019
The TakeTory Lanez
listen forThe falsetto-topped hook and the way Lanez leans into a slow-grinding mid-tempo groove instead of a straight rap cadence — the same seductive, dance-floor-slow pocket Brown works on the original.
Michael Jackson1980s · Pop / R&B / Dance
Jackson is the influence Lanez has been most explicit and theatrical about: he named him directly as one of the touchstones behind 2021's Alone at Prom and its 1980s alter ego Ashton Rain, and months later restaged the "Thriller" dance break beat-for-beat in the video for "SKAT."
listen: upstream & heresource: AllHipHop — Lanez names Hall & Oates, Toto, Michael Jackson, and Rick James as inspirations for Alone at Prom's Ashton Rain ↗
1982
ThrillerMichael Jackson
2021
SKATTory Lanez
listen forThe crisp, synth-driven pulse and choreography-first showmanship — "SKAT" lifts Jackson's zombie-breakdown staging directly, right down to the formation dancing.
Lil Wayne2000s · Hip hop / Southern hip-hop / Trap
Lanez has repeatedly cited Lil Wayne among the artists he grew up on, and Wayne's melodic, Auto-Tune-glazed hybrid of rapping and singing gave Lanez a template for the genre-agnostic "Swavey" style he built his early catalog around.
listen: upstream & heresource: Rap-Up — Lanez discusses the Chris Brown collaboration and Lil Wayne feature on Chixtape 5 ↗
2008
LollipopLil Wayne
2015
Say ItTory Lanez
listen forA chorus that's more melody than rap bars, half-sung and half-rapped over a warm, unhurried low end — the same pocket Wayne rides on "Lollipop" shows up in how loosely Lanez phrases his own hooks.