Riles

French-Algerian rapper Rilès started putting out music during his teenage years, building a fully independent process that encompassed writing, recording, and producing every track himself while also directing and editing his own videos. Entirely in English, his output blended rap and singing in a style geared toward pop audiences, accumulating millions of streams across multiple songs before his first full-length album, Welcome to the Jungle, appeared in 2019.

Born Rilès Kacimi in 1996, he began absorbing music fundamentals early through online tutorial videos. Once schooling ended he turned more seriously to creation, constructing a home studio and crafting tracks that paired infectious pop backings with commercial rap ingredients. Initial releases surfaced near 2014, followed by the 2015 EP Vanity Plus Mind. For several subsequent years he concentrated on individual singles, steadily expanding his audience through cuts such as the audacious and lighthearted 2017 track “Pesetas.” After maintaining independence for an extended period, he aligned with UMG affiliate Republic Records to issue Welcome to the Jungle in 2019. The next year he delivered the four-song EP LVL 36.