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Why Does Chance the Rapper Always Wear a '3' Hat?
"I wanted to put something else on the hat," he explained to GQ. Watch The Voice on NBC.
As a new Coach on The Voice, Chance the Rapper will bring his valuable mentorship and signature style to the show. That style includes his iconic "3" hat.
In case you haven’t noticed, Chance has been regularly sporting different variations of a baseball cap with the number "3" on it during the vast majority of his public appearances. But why, exactly, does he choose this attire? The exact reason is pretty interesting.
Why does Chance the Rapper always wear a "3" hat?
Chance the Rapper's hat-wearing days started when he was just a teenager. “I used to always rock a cap when I was in high school and get them taken away. It was an excessive amount. Like, so often that at the end of each school year, there would be a box of all the confiscated caps. After they gave back a few caps to other kids, they would just give me the box because the rest were all my hats. So I think, in one part, it’s a rebellion,” he told GQ.
But when it comes to the origins of the "3" symbol specifically, it has to do with his third project, 2016’s Coloring Book.
“I wanted to put something else on the hat. And so I decided to do ‘3’. I just thought that that made the most sense because it was the third project. Also, I was having a lot of trouble figuring out what the title of the project was going to be and what typography to put the title in. The original title for the project was, uh, The Magnificent Coloring Book. But that’s just so many words and it looks so shitty, no matter how I put it on the hat.”
The hat also has a sentimental meaning. “I’ve rationalized it to myself that it stands for the third mixtape, the holy trinity, and the three-pronged family of myself, my daughter, and my girl," he said.
Chance the Rapper talks being on The Voice
Chance opened up about his experience on TODAY in March 2023. “I feel like the other Coaches were so welcoming,” he said fondly.
He added, “My main goal on being on the show is trying to help the other Artists bring themselves out of their performances. I wanna give people the opportunity to show their identity, to tell their story through song. It's not so much about turning them into an Artist but just giving them a platform to be themselves, sing the songs they grew up listening to, really just present themselves fully."
What has Chance the Rapper been up to lately?
Aside from being a new Coach on The Voice, Chance is currently working on a project titled The Star Line Gallery.
“The Star Line Gallery has been well underway. I started it off when I first traveled to Ghana last year, and I met with some of the top contemporary Artists, painters, sculptors, all types of different visual Artists in the world and started creating connections overseas with Artists in Jamaica, and Artists on the continent, and we basically come together and create new pieces,” he told TODAY.
“I think typically as recording Artists, we make a bunch of songs, like 12 to 15 songs, and we find one Artist to collaborate with to make a piece that represents the whole album. And with this it gives me a better opportunity to give each song their own identity but [to] also be inspired by the Artists from the inception of the idea."
Watch Chance the Rapper on The Voice on NBC Mondays at 8/7c, Tuesdays at 9/8c, and next day on Peacock.
