that most hip hop fans (I'm not talking casual listeners - I'm talking hip hop
heads) never heard till Dre stepped in (section80 days)
finally someone says some truthful shyt.
Now that you mention it, it made me dig deeper into the Drizzy cosign and I found this:
http://www.mtv.com/news/1672877/drake-has-good-taste-aap-rocky-says-after-co-sign/
It's crazy that no one provided receipts like this and I have to find them to disprove parts of my own argument.
So that's settles it. Drake was the only rapper I've heard of to cosign Rocky prior to Live.Love.ASAP
Anyway, nowhere near as large as Dre/Entire West Coast crowning K Dot the new king but I'll let you cook.
Good post, homie.
I was very active, posted for a couple blogos and wrote reviews/content for various other sites during that era
rocky was curated by a bunch of tastemakers in a Facebook group...forgetting the title of it rn but it was synonymous with yams tumblr he had going on at the time. rocky didn't even write all his shyt back then. it was the same FB group that put "Gucci gucci" on. He was on DZA/main attractions tracks at the time. 4 loko, uptown, toast to the gods, etc. purple swag came out with a push, it was paid for and organized by these tastemakers/blogs etc. song was everywhere and getting the right co signs, maybe not by a rapper, but by influential Internet rap culture figures, ie tastemakers. those can be just as powerful on a lower level. Drake asked peso and drank in my cup to be played on radio before releasing one of his singles, and rocky was added to the tour even before the release of his tape. dude had like 8 songs out and was attached to the Drake tour already.
Kendrick legitimately was making music forever in the west coast scene, had done some stuff with a lot of that new west crowd, Dom Kennedy, Tiron, pac div, jay rock, soulo, schoolboy, etc. they were all sort of underground but a lot of that stuff got noticed, especially out west. Jay rock was the biggest one at the time, ketchup was a pretty big release and so was futuresex/drug sounds by Dom Kennedy. Dudes had knockin beats. Anyways dre hears Kendrick's ignorance is bliss and the two strike up a partnership. S80 was released but everything was still in house, Kendrick put out hiiiipower as the first single and this one specific dude I worked with on a site had an internship at aftermath or his cousin did at the time. He was bugging out over the stuff Kendrick was doing at the time. In studio shyt. He had loosies he passed around. I had some references of s80 tracks before they were out but wasn't really feeling them. Ronald Reagan era came out around the same time as that dre game snoop "king of the west" co sign and the combination of people REALLY liking hiiipower (which was a j cole beat, and he was the GUY before Kendrick was, especially with young people) rumors of a joint album with those two, then all of s sudden rza is on a song and he's got these other co signs. Dude was organic up to OD, s80 he was already undercover signed, and working on stuff for the future with more big names but low key
Tl:dr both dudes were curated by the industry before their "big moment"
on that
and not the one that is known for wack fashion and acts like he's from the south 
