The 2010s File Feature
My Way
My Way: Fetty Wap and Monty Double Down on the Paterson Sound By the time Fetty Wap released "My Way" in 2015, he had already established himself as one of t…
01 The Story
My Way: Fetty Wap and Monty Double Down on the Paterson Sound
By the time Fetty Wap released "My Way" in 2015, he had already established himself as one of the most unlikely and captivating breakout stories in recent hip-hop history. His debut single "Trap Queen" had emerged from relative obscurity in early 2015 and climbed all the way to number two on the Billboard Hot 100, spending months on the chart and making Fetty Wap, born Willie Maxwell II, one of the most recognizable new voices in American rap and R&B. "My Way," featuring his frequent collaborator Monty, arrived as a natural follow-up that deepened rather than redirected the aesthetic established by his debut.
The song was released through 300 Entertainment and Atlantic Records, the same label partnership that had handled "Trap Queen." 300 Entertainment, co-founded by Lyor Cohen, had positioned itself as a home for artists operating in the intersection of hip-hop authenticity and mainstream commercial appeal, and Fetty Wap was one of its most valuable early signings. Atlantic's distribution infrastructure ensured that "My Way" reached radio programmers and streaming platforms simultaneously, maximizing its commercial footprint from the moment of release.
Musically, "My Way" occupied the same melodic trap space that had made "Trap Queen" so distinctive. Fetty Wap's approach to rapping and singing simultaneously, blurring the line between the two rather than alternating between them, had a genuinely novel quality in 2015. His Auto-Tune usage was not corrective in the conventional sense but expressive, a deliberate stylistic choice that gave his vocals a warbling, yearning quality. Monty's contribution added depth and texture to the track, providing harmonic variation and reinforcing the communal creative chemistry that had developed between the two Paterson, New Jersey artists.
The song peaked at number 10 on the Billboard Hot 100, making Fetty Wap only the second artist in Hot 100 history at that point to have his first two charted singles both reach the top ten simultaneously. "Trap Queen" was still charting when "My Way" entered the top ten, a remarkable demonstration of sustained commercial momentum. The achievement underscored how thoroughly Fetty Wap had captured the public imagination in 2015.
The production carried the signature atmospheric quality of much of Fetty Wap's early work: minor-key melodies, rolling trap percussion with pronounced hi-hat patterns, and a spacious low end that gave the vocals room to float above the beat. The sound drew on the melodic sensibilities of Southern trap while incorporating elements of R&B vocal tradition, creating a hybrid that felt fresh without being deliberately experimental.
Lyrically, "My Way" dealt in the affirmations of loyalty, ambition, and romantic devotion that ran through much of Fetty Wap's early catalog. The narrator addresses both a romantic partner and, by extension, the world that had dismissed him before his success, asserting that circumstances had changed on his own terms. The Paterson, New Jersey background was central to his self-presentation: this was music about making it out without losing the thread back to where you came from.
The song appeared on Fetty Wap's self-titled debut album, released in September 2015. That album entered the Billboard 200 at number one, making Fetty Wap one of the few artists in 2015 to debut at the top of both the singles and albums charts. The album contained multiple additional charting singles, demonstrating a level of artistic consistency that silenced some of the "one-hit wonder" speculation that had briefly surrounded him after "Trap Queen."
A remix of "My Way" featuring Drake was released and circulated widely, though the original version with Monty remained the commercially dominant version. The Drake remix illustrated how thoroughly the hip-hop establishment had embraced Fetty Wap by mid-2015: having one of the genre's biggest stars opt in as a collaborator was as clear an endorsement as the industry could offer.
The music video for "My Way" maintained the visual language Fetty Wap had established with "Trap Queen": scenes of Paterson street life, displays of earned success, and a tone that balanced celebration with the awareness of how precarious such success can feel. Monty appeared throughout, reinforcing the group identity that distinguished Fetty Wap's public image from the solitary star narrative that dominates much of mainstream rap.
Fetty Wap's 2015 run remains one of the most sustained chart dominances in a single calendar year by a debut artist in modern Billboard Hot 100 history. "My Way" was central to that run, demonstrating that "Trap Queen" had not been an accident but the opening statement of a coherent and commercially potent artistic vision. The song's placement in the top ten, achieved at the same moment his debut single was still performing, cemented the year as definitively his.
In retrospect, "My Way" also captures a specific moment in hip-hop's commercial evolution when the barriers between rapping and singing were dissolving in real time, driven partly by artists like Fetty Wap who simply ignored those barriers in favor of expressing whatever they were feeling in whatever form felt natural. That approach, now commonplace across the genre, was still surprising enough in 2015 to feel genuinely distinctive.
02 Song Meaning
What My Way Says About Loyalty, Place, and Earned Success
"My Way" by Fetty Wap featuring Monty is built around a declaration that carries weight precisely because of the context in which it is made. The title phrase is not a casual boast. It is a statement about the terms on which success has been achieved and on which relationships are conducted. The narrator is not simply saying that things are going well. He is saying that the specific path he took, uncompromised by outside pressure or expectation, has led to where he now stands.
The idea of doing things "my way" in American popular music has a long lineage, most famously associated with the Frank Sinatra standard, which itself borrowed the melody from a French song and transformed it into an anthem of self-determination. Fetty Wap's use of the phrase operates in a different register but draws on some of the same cultural weight: the sense that the path chosen was not the obvious or expected one, and that the outcome vindicates the choice. Where Sinatra's version looks backward across a long life, Fetty Wap's is forward-facing and immediate, rooted in the present tense of early success.
Paterson, New Jersey is woven into the meaning of the song even without being named explicitly. Fetty Wap's consistent grounding of his public identity in his hometown gave all of his 2015 output a specific geographic and social context. The success celebrated in "My Way" is not generic but local, connected to a particular community and set of circumstances. This specificity is part of what gave the song its emotional authenticity: the listener understood that the narrator's triumph was not hypothetical but was rooted in real departure from real conditions.
Monty's presence on the track deepens this meaning. The two artists had a long creative and personal history before either achieved commercial recognition. Having Monty on the record is itself a statement about loyalty: these people were there before the success arrived, and they remain part of the picture after it. That kind of consistent acknowledgment of collaborative community distinguished Fetty Wap's public presentation from the solitary genius narrative that dominates many pop-star origin stories.
The romantic dimension of the song adds another layer. The narrator's address to a partner is framed in terms of loyalty and mutual recognition: this person saw something worth seeing at a time when the world had not yet caught up. Romantic loyalty and neighborhood loyalty operate on the same register in the song, both understood as forms of seeing someone clearly and staying committed to that vision regardless of external validation. The convergence of those two types of loyalty gives the track an emotional coherence that extends beyond its surface narrative.
There is also an implicit argument in the song about authenticity and commercial success. The tension between selling records and maintaining credibility is one of hip-hop's most persistent preoccupations. "My Way" sidesteps that tension by framing success as the natural consequence of being yourself rather than as a compromise with external expectations. The singer's melodic, genre-blurring delivery style, which some early critics found unconventional, becomes evidence for the song's own thesis: this is what doing it your own way sounds like, and it works.
The song ultimately offers a version of self-actualization that is specific to its cultural moment: not the polished, aspirational self-actualization of mainstream motivation culture, but a grittier, more contingent version that acknowledges the obstacles without dwelling on them. The focus is on arrival, not on hardship, which is itself a form of dignity. The meaning is in the refusal to make suffering the centerpiece of the story.
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