In early February this year, 20-year-old Brooklyn-born rapper Pop Smoke was gunned down after a house party in the Hollywood Hills. His tragic death was yet another name in the lengthening list of young hip-hop artists whose lives were taken from them too soon.
What is startling about these deaths is that many of the rappers who have recently died, such as Mac Miller, XXXTentaction, Lil Peep and Juice Wrld were all under the age of 26.
With the addition of Pop Smoke to this list, the overall well-being of hip-hop’s young stars has been thrust into the spotlight.
The unfortunate truth behind many of these deaths is that they were drug-related. It does not take a hip-hop savant to know that drug abuse is one of the more popular subjects in the genre, and many of these artists are speaking their truth when talking about their struggles in their music.
“We don’t talk about [drugs] from a good point of view or a bad point of view, we talk about it from a realistic point of view. It’s like what we’re going through and how we feel,” Juice Wrld said.
While many artists write their music about how drugs have influenced their life, there are equally as many who no longer use drugs but still mention them in their songs.
“It’s hard because I don’t want to stop it, and the fans stop loving me,” Future said. “I didn’t want to tell anybody I stopped drinking lean [a slang term for prescription-grade cough syrup mixed with a soft drink and hard candy] because I felt like people would say, ‘His music changed because he isn’t drinking lean anymore.’ It’s hard when your fans get so used to a certain persona.”
Artists continue to struggle with the back and forth of whether or not they should keep their habits or stop them and risk facing the reputational consequences.
Being that Georgia State is in the hip-hop capital of the world, there are many aspiring rappers and musicians looking to break into the industry. With so many young students looking to enter this world, it is important that the culture does a better job of protecting them.
Preston Powell, a freshman at Georgia State, spoke on what goes through his mind when watching the people he idolizes die at a young age.
“I’ve watched artists grow up in front of my eyes, and one day, they’re just gone. Most of the time, they’re only two, three years older than me,” Powell said. “I don’t make music personally, but I have a lot of friends that do. I wouldn’t be worried about them until they signed a record deal and started dealing with all the stress that comes with being in the music industry.”
Drug use is not the only thing that a young hip-hop artist must learn to balance. They must also make a decision on whether they should stay in their hometown or move elsewhere. In 2018, rapper Nipsey Hussle was gunned down in his own community of Crenshaw in Los Angeles.
Many in the rap community were shocked when the rapper die, as he was widely considered a pillar of his community.
“Hatred, jealously, envy. People looking at you saying, ‘I wish that was me”. Charlamange tha God said.
XXXTentacion is another example of an artist whose life was taken from them because of violence from their own community.
“When you think of rappers who got killed in their own hood, obviously, I think of Nipsey, but I also think about guys like XXXTentacion and Bankroll Fresh,” Nick Curtin, a freshman at Georgia State, said. “It’s a lot of names that died in their own hood.”
When Pop Smoke was shot and killed, Curtin said that “these guys aren’t safe anywhere.”.
No matter where artists choose to rest their heads, they must always be aware of the status that they hold. In the past decade, social media has made celebrities more accessible than they have ever been in the past. Young artists coming into the game have to realize that, once they enter the spotlight, their whole life changes.
“Artists get on interviews and talk about how their life changes after they blow up, but I feel like nobody really understands it until they’re in the situation themselves,” Powell said. “I don’t know if I’d be able to do it.”
At the end of the day, the culture must protect its young stars.
“As fans of hip-hop, we have to change the culture surrounding the artists,” Curtin said. “The way it is right now, we could definitely do a better job of supporting our favorite artists, instead of tearing them down.”
