When he was released in September of that year, the rapper reportedly headed straight to rehab in the hopes of finally achieving sobriety. The drugs were thought to be a mixture for“purple drank,” a combination of codeine and promethazine, a commondrug reference in southern hip-hop culture. Phillip Coleman, 34, a rapper in Rochester, New York, who goes by the name GodclouD, started using at age 15 after being prescribed 5-milligram tablets of Percocet following wisdom tooth extraction. That set him on a path to misusing prescription painkillers, which led to cocaine and then a heroin addiction that eventually landed him in prison. While it’s a misguided notion to squarely place blame on rappers, or the even broader stroke of “Hip Hop” for brandishing drug culture, a positive reflection in the public eye shouldn’t go unnoticed. Recently there has been a noticeable shift in the mindset of some MCs when it comes to self-medicating on opiates.

Percocet

In February 2016, rapper Macklemore released “The Unruly Mess I’ve Made,” a record in which addiction what rapper does the most drugs is a recurring topic. A few months later, he met with President Barack Obama at the White House to discuss the realities of this disease. “Overdose amongst rappers and Americans in general has become an epidemic,  unfortunately,” she tells XXL. “In my experience, I have noted that there are more overdoses due in part to illicitly manufactured synthetic opiates and stimulants. Those manufacturing and selling these illicit substances are mixing their products with fentanyl.”

• That toxicity reaches into populations already plagued by perpetual cycles of poverty, poor health and lowered life expectancy.
• He also appeared on Jay-Z’s hit “Big Pimpin” in2000 as well as “Sippin on Some Syrup” by Three Six Mafia.
• He’s worked with some of the biggest names in the game, from Drake to Jay-Z.
• Today, he regularly attends 12-step programs, which are self-help meetings designed to treat destructive behaviors, including substance misuse.

Alcohol

Reportedly, these delusions caused him to believe that his roommate had a demon inside her, with catastrophic results. Ross’ worst run-in with the law so far happened in 2015, when he and his bodyguard were arrested for allegedly kidnapping a man and assaulting him (per Billboard). According to CBS News, the multiple charges the rapper faced stemmed from an incident where he threatened two groundskeepers of his mansion with a gun, forcing them into a guest house on the premises and beating one of them with said gun. However, Ross was able to get a plea deal that allowed him to get away with a five-year probation.

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• “It’s a variety of colors that you have,” PatvFoo said, referencing the various formulations of codeine cough syrups.
• According to the Daily News, in 1991 he was sentenced to two years of probation and a $1,782 fine — among other conditions — due to a gun charge involving a “parking lot confrontation” with a homeless person.
• Loss and tragedy in the form of substance abuse and addiction have wracked the hip-hop community for far too long.

As a chaotic decade comes to a close, we’re speaking to the people who helped shape the last ten years and analysing the cultural shifts that have defined them. Explore the decade on our interactive timeline here, or head here to check out all our features. Patrick Williams, 26, an independent rapper from Orange, Texas, with the stage name PatvFoo, is no stranger to addiction. Eminem credits fatherhood with helping him to get sober once and for all. Other sober rappers include Macklemore, Kendrick Lamar, Ice-T, and Andre 3000. With the truth out about the fatal consequences of the string of illicit and synthetic drugs, it should prove interesting to see how the music — Hip Hop music to be exact — echoes the message going forward.

Pop Culture

He was arrested for selling cocaine to an undercover officer at age 19. In songs and interviews, Jay-Z has discussed the ubiquity of drugs he saw while growing up in Brooklyn in the 1980s. The streets of New York were rife with illicit Drug rehabilitation substances, and Jay-Z saw evidence of crack use everywhere. In the ’80s, as rap music grew in popularity, crack cocaine use swept the nation. Processed with ammonia or baking soda, crack is a freebase form of cocaine that can be smoked to achieve a high.

How Alcohol Mentions in Rap Music Can Influence Youths

It then trickled down to popular radio hits in the early aughts, most notably with Lil Wayne. In November 2017, Lil Peep posted a series of messages, images and videos to Instagram. In one post, he talked about how he relied on prescription pills for happiness, but that the feeling was always fleeting. In his song “Finish Line/Drown,” he explained how his addiction to Xanax led to memory problems and lost opportunities in his career. In an interview with GQ magazine, he spoke more extensively about his addiction to the antianxiety medication. In 2006, after the death of a friend, he began abusing Vicodin, one of the most dispensed prescription painkillers in the United States.