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Hip hop stars are taking their reputations to Wall Street and Sand Hill road.

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Unlike their rock star brethren, who鈥檝e historically been disinterested in dabbling with startups, quite a few hip hop artists have amassed good-sized portfolios. They鈥檝e seen a few big hits too, most recently including a massive up round for zero-commission stock trading platform , which counted Jay Z, Nas, and Snoop Dogg among its earlier backers.

But just how deep does the hip hop-startup relationship go and where is it headed? To shed some light on that question, we put together a review of 附近上门 data on the startup investment activity of famous musicians. We looked at both hip hop and pop stars, culling a artists who are either active investors or have joined one or more rounds in recent years.

The general conclusion: Artists are doing more deals, raising more funds, and backing more companies that graduate to up rounds and exits. Here are a few examples:

• Besides getting a slice of Robinhood, and his entertainment company, , also saw an early portfolio company, flight club startup , go on to raise financing a year ago at a reported valuation over $1.5 billion. Roc Nation also made headlines this week for investing in , a startup providing alternatives to incarceration for people who can鈥檛 afford bail.
• , the investment fund co-founded by , was an early stage investor in video doorbell maker , which Amazon just bought for $1.1 billion. The firm could also see some paper gains this week in much-anticipated market debut of , which it backed in a 2014 Series C round. In addition, Queensbridge participated in a $25 million Series B round for cryptocurrency trading platform back in 2013. Coinbase鈥檚 last reported valuation was around $1.6 billion.
• , a cannabis-focused venture fund co-founded by , has closed its debut fund with $45 million. Just this week it backed a $3.5 million round for vape manufacturer .

That鈥檚 not to say everything a star touches turns multi-platinum. We found quite a few flops in their portfolios and assembled a list here of that counted a hip hop or pop star among their backers.

Of course, flops are part of life for early stage investors, so there鈥檚 no reason we鈥檇 expect celebrities to be an exception. Moreover, most of the now-shuttered companies were not heavily capitalized by venture standards.

However, there are some higher profile or more heavily funded companies on the flop list. One is , a laundry delivery service, which raised $17 million from Nas and twenty other investors before hanging itself out to dry in 2016. Another is , an app for shooting and sharing video clips backed by Roc Nation.

Why The Rich, Hip, And Famous Like Startups

A number of venture pundits and pop culture mavens have previously pontificated why celebrities, and hip hop stars in particular, are drawn to startups.

One possibility is that rap music and startups resemble each other at the earliest stages, Cam Houser, CEO of the 3 Day Startup Program. Rap music starts with a rapper and a producer. This duality, he says, is similar to the beginning stages of a startup, which commonly also brings together two people, a business and a technical cofounder.

Rap and startup entrepreneurship are also both longshot career tracks that and unabashed self-promotion. To make it, however, both require an excellent grasp of what sells in the real world.

Branding is perhaps the most common rationale provided for the celebrity-startup connection. With their massive fan bases, swooning coverage, and millions of social media followers, celebrities can certainly help get the word out about a new product or app. That said, the attention usually works only if said product also has compelling attributes of its own.

One of the less controversial explanations is that becoming and remaining famous requires many of the same skills and qualities as running an entrepreneurial venture, including an exceptional degree of tenacity.

It鈥檚 also true that in venture capital and the music business, it鈥檚 the hits that matter. It helps that we鈥檙e seeing plenty of those.