Aaron Cole achieved renown for his versatility in Christian hip-hop circles during the 2010s and 2020s. His songs mix street rap and R&B musical idioms with heartfelt autobiography and inspirational messaging. Born in Virginia in 1999, the Nashville-reared rapper and singer began honing his musicianship at the age of three and released his first album, Jesus Is the Rock, at four. In the early 2010s, he unveiled a more mature sound, based around a slick, malleable rhyming style and gospel-influenced singing. As his star grew on the Christian charts, Cole consistently demonstrated his ability to seamlessly integrate expressions of devotion into relatable secular narratives. He broadened his commercial appeal on a prolific run of albums and EPs in the late 2010s and early 2020s, scoring hits like 2017’s club-ready “Right on Time”—featuring Cole’s label head TobyMac—and 2021’s “LIKE YOU”, which finds Cole in soulful trap mode.