Canon

Born in Chicago and now based in Nashville, Aaron “Canon” McCain serves as a Christian hip-hop artist affiliated with Reflection Music Group. He first gained notice working as Lecrae’s hype man before launching his solo career in 2012. The 2014 EP Loose Canon, Vol. 2 placed him on the Billboard 200 for the first time, yet a near-fatal accident soon afterward threatened to end his momentum. Two years later he released Loose Canon, Vol. 3, which, like the 2018 album Home and the 2019 single Whole Team Winning recorded with Derek Minor and Byron Juane, registered strongly on Billboard’s rap albums chart. In 2021 he unveiled the single “I Made It” to herald the arrival of the EP We Made It later that same year.

Raised on secular hip-hop in a lower-middle-class Chicago neighborhood, McCain leaned on the steady influence of his church-attending mother and grandfather to steer clear of drugs, crime, and gang life. He redirected his energies toward the spiritual dimension of the genre that had shaped him. After studying at Bible College in Memphis he connected with Lecrae, the CCM hip-hop figure, producer, and businessman whose guidance, along with that of Reach Records frontman Derek Minor, helped launch his career. Canon’s first mixtape, The Great Investment, appeared in 2009, followed by a guest spot on Lecrae’s 2011 project Rehab: The Overdose. He spent the rest of that year touring with Lecrae before signing with Reflection Music Group. The label issued the EP Loose Canon in 2012 and the full-length debut Mad Haven the following year. In 2014 he returned with the RayRock- and Eighty7-produced Loose Canon, Vol. 2. Late that year, while helping at a car-crash scene, he sustained injuries that kept him sidelined for months. He resumed performing in 2015 and began work on the next installment, which surfaced a year later as Loose Canon, Vol. 3. The set reached number 15 on the Billboard rap chart and included appearances by Derek Minor on “Over Do It” and TJ Pompeo on “My Little Baby.” Canon re-emerged in December 2018 with the album Home and, in 2019, with Whole Team Winning alongside Derek Minor and Byron Juane. Two years afterward he delivered We Made It, a seven-track project addressing anxiety and depression.