WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.439 Welcome back to the Deep Dive. I have to be honest 00:00:03.439 --> 00:00:06.379 with you, I spent the last 48 hours just living 00:00:06.379 --> 00:00:08.320 inside the source material we pulled for today, 00:00:08.439 --> 00:00:10.759 and I feel like I've just walked out of a very 00:00:10.759 --> 00:00:14.140 loud, very emotional concert that ended way, 00:00:14.220 --> 00:00:16.679 way too abruptly. That's a good way to put it. 00:00:16.800 --> 00:00:19.480 My ears are still ringing, and my heart is kind 00:00:19.480 --> 00:00:22.230 of heavy. That is probably the most accurate 00:00:22.230 --> 00:00:24.850 way to describe the experience of digging into 00:00:24.850 --> 00:00:28.769 the life and the very sudden death of Jared Anthony 00:00:28.769 --> 00:00:31.530 Higgins. Though the world, and I think history 00:00:31.530 --> 00:00:34.049 at this point, knows him as Juice World. Right. 00:00:34.289 --> 00:00:36.369 The voice that essentially defined a generation 00:00:36.369 --> 00:00:38.549 of heartbreak. But here is the thing that kept 00:00:38.549 --> 00:00:40.229 hitting me as I was reading through these files, 00:00:40.310 --> 00:00:41.549 and I want to get your take on this immediately. 00:00:42.090 --> 00:00:44.450 We usually talk about career trajectories in 00:00:44.450 --> 00:00:46.770 terms of decades. Yeah, the slow burn. You know, 00:00:46.789 --> 00:00:49.399 the drill. The 10 -year struggle in the underground, 00:00:49.679 --> 00:00:52.619 the slow breakthrough, the peak years, the gradual 00:00:52.619 --> 00:00:55.640 decline. With Juice World, we are looking at 00:00:55.640 --> 00:00:59.380 a story that is compressed into, what, two years? 00:00:59.799 --> 00:01:02.780 Essentially, yes. It is a story of extreme velocity. 00:01:03.299 --> 00:01:05.780 It is a timeline that moves so fast it almost 00:01:05.780 --> 00:01:08.560 blurs when you look at it closely. And that's 00:01:08.560 --> 00:01:10.819 the hook for me today, the sheer speed of it. 00:01:11.019 --> 00:01:14.120 We were talking about a kid recording on a cracked 00:01:14.120 --> 00:01:16.620 iPhone in a high school hallway, and then you 00:01:16.620 --> 00:01:19.769 blink. Literally. It feels like you blink. And 00:01:19.769 --> 00:01:22.269 he's signing a $3 million deal with Interscope. 00:01:22.370 --> 00:01:25.170 It is a meteoric rise in the truest, most literal 00:01:25.170 --> 00:01:27.349 sense of the word. Meteoric is the right word. 00:01:27.530 --> 00:01:30.090 Because meteors burn incredibly bright, they 00:01:30.090 --> 00:01:32.430 move faster than anything else in the sky. And 00:01:32.430 --> 00:01:35.450 often, well, they crash. And that is the other 00:01:35.450 --> 00:01:37.349 side of this paradox we have to look at. The 00:01:37.349 --> 00:01:40.299 crash. The tragedy. Exactly. Balanced against 00:01:40.299 --> 00:01:43.560 that astronomical one in a billion success is 00:01:43.560 --> 00:01:46.719 a lifelong, very public and very visceral battle 00:01:46.719 --> 00:01:49.180 with addiction. A battle that ended his life 00:01:49.180 --> 00:01:52.500 at the deeply young age of 21. 21. It's a number 00:01:52.500 --> 00:01:55.560 that just, it hangs there. So our mission today, 00:01:55.659 --> 00:01:56.980 and I want to be clear to you listening right 00:01:56.980 --> 00:01:59.519 now, this isn't just a biography. We aren't just 00:01:59.519 --> 00:02:01.180 going to list dates and albums and say, and then 00:02:01.180 --> 00:02:03.159 this happened. No, that would be a disservice 00:02:03.159 --> 00:02:05.420 to the complexity of who he was. We're going 00:02:05.420 --> 00:02:07.859 to unpack the phenomenon. We need to understand 00:02:07.859 --> 00:02:11.300 SoundCloud rap and emo rap, not just as buzzwords 00:02:11.300 --> 00:02:13.900 people throw around, but as actual cultural shifts. 00:02:14.080 --> 00:02:17.479 We need to talk about his process, which, honestly, 00:02:17.599 --> 00:02:20.479 reading about it, it defies the laws of physics. 00:02:20.719 --> 00:02:23.099 It defies the logic of how we think music is 00:02:23.099 --> 00:02:26.159 made. It completely upends the traditional songwriting 00:02:26.159 --> 00:02:28.560 manual. And finally, we have to navigate the 00:02:28.560 --> 00:02:31.099 legacy. Because even though he passed in 2019, 00:02:31.400 --> 00:02:34.680 the business of Juice WRLD is booming. There 00:02:34.680 --> 00:02:37.060 are massive questions here about posthumous albums, 00:02:37.240 --> 00:02:39.659 about the ethics of finishing a dead artist's 00:02:39.659 --> 00:02:42.460 work, and how we manage the art of someone who 00:02:42.460 --> 00:02:44.979 isn't here to say yes or no. And we have a massive 00:02:44.979 --> 00:02:47.680 stack of sources today. Biographies, police reports, 00:02:47.900 --> 00:02:50.319 discography notes, interviews, estate filings, 00:02:50.379 --> 00:02:52.439 the whole nine yards. It's a lot to get through. 00:02:52.599 --> 00:02:54.879 So buckle up. Let's dive in. Let's do it. I want 00:02:54.879 --> 00:02:56.759 to start with the geography. Because usually 00:02:56.759 --> 00:02:59.039 when we talk about Chicago hip hop, we have a 00:02:59.039 --> 00:03:02.699 very specific image in our minds. We think of 00:03:02.699 --> 00:03:05.340 the South Side. We think of drill music. We think 00:03:05.340 --> 00:03:07.900 of Chief Keef. We think of grit and concrete. 00:03:08.099 --> 00:03:11.419 Right. Aggressive, nihilistic beats. Music that 00:03:11.419 --> 00:03:14.219 reflects a very specific, very hard reality. 00:03:14.560 --> 00:03:18.479 But Jared Higgins, he is a little different. 00:03:18.500 --> 00:03:20.719 He was born in the city proper, December 2nd, 00:03:20.719 --> 00:03:24.050 1998. But he didn't stay there. No. His family 00:03:24.050 --> 00:03:27.090 moved. They moved to the south suburbs. Homewood, 00:03:27.090 --> 00:03:29.530 Illinois. Homewood Flossmoor. Now, for people 00:03:29.530 --> 00:03:31.629 who aren't from the Chicagoland area, help us 00:03:31.629 --> 00:03:34.550 place that. Is that the hood? Not exactly. I 00:03:34.550 --> 00:03:37.069 mean, it's a suburb. It's middle class to working 00:03:37.069 --> 00:03:39.550 class. It's very diverse, but it's distinct from 00:03:39.550 --> 00:03:41.909 the inner city. It's a place with good schools 00:03:41.909 --> 00:03:44.389 like Homewood Flossmoor High, which is actually 00:03:44.389 --> 00:03:46.710 known for its arts programs. OK, so it's a totally 00:03:46.710 --> 00:03:48.590 different environment from the one that birthed 00:03:48.590 --> 00:03:50.590 drill music. Completely. And that distinction 00:03:50.590 --> 00:03:53.310 matters. It really, really matters for his. sound 00:03:53.310 --> 00:03:55.469 and the home life was different too this wasn't 00:03:55.469 --> 00:03:57.349 a chaotic household in the traditional sense 00:03:57.349 --> 00:04:00.409 it was a single parent home yes his parents divorced 00:04:00.409 --> 00:04:02.650 when he was just three years old yeah which is 00:04:02.650 --> 00:04:06.849 a pivotal age for any child And sadly, his father 00:04:06.849 --> 00:04:10.030 passed away later, in June 2019, just months 00:04:10.030 --> 00:04:12.889 before Jarrett himself died. But for the vast 00:04:12.889 --> 00:04:15.250 majority of his life, he was raised by his mother, 00:04:15.629 --> 00:04:18.029 Carmela Wallace. And Carmela sounds like a force 00:04:18.029 --> 00:04:20.350 of nature in the source material. She was. And 00:04:20.350 --> 00:04:23.310 she was extremely religious, a very conservative 00:04:23.310 --> 00:04:26.449 Christian. The sources mention a specific rule 00:04:26.449 --> 00:04:28.550 she had in the house, which I found fascinating, 00:04:28.810 --> 00:04:31.790 considering who her son became. No hip -hop. 00:04:31.990 --> 00:04:34.610 Right. The future king of SoundCloud rap wasn't 00:04:34.610 --> 00:04:36.949 allowed to listen to rap. Explicitly forbidden. 00:04:37.490 --> 00:04:40.649 She felt the lyrics were too violent, too misogynistic, 00:04:40.649 --> 00:04:43.170 just generally destructive. She wanted to protect 00:04:43.170 --> 00:04:45.709 him from that influence. She wanted a, you know, 00:04:45.730 --> 00:04:48.709 a holy household. That is such a classic parenting 00:04:48.709 --> 00:04:51.709 backfire moment, isn't it? You ban the thing 00:04:51.709 --> 00:04:54.370 and it becomes the forbidden fruit. Oh, 100%. 00:04:54.370 --> 00:04:55.810 It becomes the most interesting thing in the 00:04:55.810 --> 00:04:58.230 world. But it also did something else. Something 00:04:58.230 --> 00:05:00.850 unintentional but crucial for his artistry. It 00:05:00.850 --> 00:05:03.350 forced him to look for music elsewhere. Exactly. 00:05:03.350 --> 00:05:06.290 If he couldn't listen to Jay -Z or 50 Cent in 00:05:06.290 --> 00:05:08.370 the living room, what was left? Video games. 00:05:08.610 --> 00:05:12.269 The loophole. The ultimate 90s and early 2000s 00:05:12.269 --> 00:05:14.649 loophole. I love this detail because it makes 00:05:14.649 --> 00:05:17.370 me feel so seen. He discovered music through 00:05:17.370 --> 00:05:19.910 Tony Hawk's Pro Skater and Guitar Hero. Think 00:05:19.910 --> 00:05:21.769 about those soundtracks for a second. If you 00:05:21.769 --> 00:05:24.470 grew up in that era, those playlists are burned 00:05:24.470 --> 00:05:26.209 into your brain. Oh, I can hear them right now. 00:05:26.290 --> 00:05:29.569 Goldfinger, Rage Against the Machine. Blank 182. 00:05:30.229 --> 00:05:34.610 Panic, At the Disco, Black Sabbath, Megadeth, 00:05:34.790 --> 00:05:38.370 Billy Idol. This was a curriculum of rock, pop 00:05:38.370 --> 00:05:40.470 punk, and heavy metal. It was a whole education. 00:05:41.009 --> 00:05:43.290 So while other kids in Chicago are absorbing 00:05:43.290 --> 00:05:46.050 the rhythmic patterns of trap music or the storytelling 00:05:46.050 --> 00:05:49.310 of Nas, Gerard is subconsciously memorizing pop 00:05:49.310 --> 00:05:51.629 punk chord progressions and heavy metal riffs. 00:05:52.000 --> 00:05:54.600 He is internalizing melody. He's learning about 00:05:54.600 --> 00:05:57.339 angst, but a specific type of suburban rock and 00:05:57.339 --> 00:05:59.639 roll angst. The nobody understands me, I'm all 00:05:59.639 --> 00:06:02.540 alone themes of emo music. This explains so much 00:06:02.540 --> 00:06:04.699 about his future sound. When people ask, why 00:06:04.699 --> 00:06:06.980 was Juice WRLD so melodic? Why did he sing as 00:06:06.980 --> 00:06:08.759 much as he rapped? Why did he sound like that? 00:06:08.920 --> 00:06:11.300 It's because his foundational education was Billy 00:06:11.300 --> 00:06:14.149 Idol, not Biggie Smalls. And he wasn't just a 00:06:14.149 --> 00:06:16.550 passive listener. This is key. He wasn't just 00:06:16.550 --> 00:06:19.470 consuming this stuff. He was dissecting it. No, 00:06:19.529 --> 00:06:21.949 he was an active participant from a very young 00:06:21.949 --> 00:06:24.649 age. He was a multi -instrumentalist by the time 00:06:24.649 --> 00:06:26.529 he was in grade school. The sources say piano 00:06:26.529 --> 00:06:29.129 at age four. Age four. His mother paid for lessons. 00:06:29.430 --> 00:06:31.930 Then he picks up the guitar on his own. Then 00:06:31.930 --> 00:06:34.569 the drums. Then the trumpet for the school band. 00:06:35.170 --> 00:06:38.430 So let's debunk a myth right away. There is this 00:06:38.430 --> 00:06:40.949 criticism of SoundCloud rappers from the old 00:06:40.949 --> 00:06:43.410 guard that they're just kids with laptops who 00:06:43.410 --> 00:06:45.589 don't know music, who just mumble over beats. 00:06:45.750 --> 00:06:47.870 Right, the mumble rap stigma, that they have 00:06:47.870 --> 00:06:50.790 no musicality. But Jared Higgins had music theory 00:06:50.790 --> 00:06:53.970 in his blood. He understood structure. He understood 00:06:53.970 --> 00:06:56.490 chords. He knew how to build a song before he 00:06:56.490 --> 00:06:58.470 ever learned how to record one. He understood 00:06:58.470 --> 00:07:01.029 harmony. He understood rhythm from a drummer's 00:07:01.029 --> 00:07:03.329 perspective. That is a massive, massive advantage. 00:07:03.769 --> 00:07:06.310 However, while this musical prodigy is developing, 00:07:06.569 --> 00:07:09.069 there is a shadow growing right alongside it. 00:07:09.170 --> 00:07:11.689 And we have to address this early on because 00:07:11.689 --> 00:07:14.250 it is not something that happened after the fame. 00:07:14.329 --> 00:07:18.189 It started way before. The substance abuse. The 00:07:18.189 --> 00:07:21.310 sources are startlingly... clear and frankly 00:07:21.310 --> 00:07:23.850 very disturbing on this. He started drinking 00:07:23.850 --> 00:07:26.550 lean in the sixth grade. Sixth grade. I mean, 00:07:26.569 --> 00:07:28.689 pause on that. That is an 11 or 12 year old child. 00:07:28.829 --> 00:07:30.610 Yes. For you listening, you might not be familiar 00:07:30.610 --> 00:07:33.649 with the terminology. What exactly is lean? We 00:07:33.649 --> 00:07:35.389 hear it in rap songs all the time, but what is 00:07:35.389 --> 00:07:38.149 it chemically? It is a mixture of prescription 00:07:38.149 --> 00:07:41.889 grade cough syrup, specifically containing codeine 00:07:41.889 --> 00:07:44.839 and promethazine. usually mixed with soda like 00:07:44.839 --> 00:07:48.279 Sprite and often hard candy like Jolly Ranchers 00:07:48.279 --> 00:07:50.519 to sweeten the taste. So it's an opioid cocktail. 00:07:50.680 --> 00:07:53.259 It's a powerful opioid cocktail. It is a downer. 00:07:53.279 --> 00:07:55.180 It slows your heart rate, gives you a feeling 00:07:55.180 --> 00:07:57.740 of euphoria and detachment. And he's doing this 00:07:57.740 --> 00:08:01.360 at age 12. And by 2013, his freshman or sophomore 00:08:01.360 --> 00:08:03.779 year of high school, he has moved on to Percocet 00:08:03.779 --> 00:08:07.120 and Xanax. These are heavy, heavy pharmaceuticals. 00:08:07.139 --> 00:08:08.660 And these aren't party drugs in the same way. 00:08:09.079 --> 00:08:12.339 Xanax is a benzodiazepine for anxiety. Percocet. 00:08:12.399 --> 00:08:15.240 is a powerful opioid painkiller. Exactly. Why? 00:08:15.420 --> 00:08:17.660 Do the sources give us any insight into the why? 00:08:17.759 --> 00:08:19.500 Was it just peer pressure? Was it trying to look 00:08:19.500 --> 00:08:21.879 cool? It is complex. I mean, there is the peer 00:08:21.879 --> 00:08:23.939 element, sure. He was around other kids who were 00:08:23.939 --> 00:08:26.680 experimenting. But there is also a clear thread 00:08:26.680 --> 00:08:29.040 of self -medication that runs through his whole 00:08:29.040 --> 00:08:32.100 story. He talked later about anxiety, about feeling 00:08:32.100 --> 00:08:34.399 overwhelmed. He wasn't just partying. He was 00:08:34.399 --> 00:08:36.700 trying to numb something inside him. It's just 00:08:36.700 --> 00:08:38.779 heartbreaking. You have this brilliant, talented 00:08:38.779 --> 00:08:41.559 kid, and he is already chemically dependent. 00:08:41.610 --> 00:08:45.389 before he can even drive a car. And yet, there 00:08:45.389 --> 00:08:48.210 is this weird duality in his teenage years. He 00:08:48.210 --> 00:08:50.309 was smoking cigarettes, right? A pack a day. 00:08:50.409 --> 00:08:53.289 Pretty heavy. But the sources say he quit smoking 00:08:53.289 --> 00:08:56.230 his senior year because of health issues. Wait. 00:08:56.330 --> 00:08:58.669 He quit cigarettes for his health, but he was 00:08:58.669 --> 00:09:01.860 popping Xanax. It shows the rationalization of 00:09:01.860 --> 00:09:04.360 addiction, doesn't it? It's a very common psychological 00:09:04.360 --> 00:09:07.200 pattern. How so? You cut out the bad thing that 00:09:07.200 --> 00:09:09.639 makes you cough or affects your stamina for basketball, 00:09:09.840 --> 00:09:11.879 but you keep the medicine that makes you feel 00:09:11.879 --> 00:09:14.980 mentally okay, even if it is physically destroying 00:09:14.980 --> 00:09:17.600 you in a much more insidious way. So we have 00:09:17.600 --> 00:09:20.179 the tension building, the strict religious mom, 00:09:20.340 --> 00:09:22.679 the hidden drug use, the rock and roll influences. 00:09:22.899 --> 00:09:26.659 And then around 2015, his sophomore year, he 00:09:26.659 --> 00:09:28.539 starts trying to get his voice out there. Enter 00:09:28.539 --> 00:09:31.480 Juice the Kid. Juice the Kid. One word. Where 00:09:31.480 --> 00:09:34.139 did the name come from? It is a callback to the 00:09:34.139 --> 00:09:37.740 1992 film Juice, starring Tupac Shakur. Tupac, 00:09:37.740 --> 00:09:40.179 okay. Now, Tupac was a massive influence on it. 00:09:40.179 --> 00:09:43.259 That's huge. But specifically, the character 00:09:43.259 --> 00:09:46.039 Bishop in that movie, the haircut, the attitude, 00:09:46.480 --> 00:09:48.700 Gerard identified with that rebellious energy. 00:09:49.019 --> 00:09:50.980 And eventually, he modifies it. He drops the 00:09:50.980 --> 00:09:55.039 kid and adds world, but spelled W -R -L -L -D. 00:09:55.299 --> 00:09:57.669 Which he said stood for world. It represented 00:09:57.669 --> 00:09:59.809 his ambition of taking over the world. Which 00:09:59.809 --> 00:10:02.470 is incredibly ambitious for a kid recording in 00:10:02.470 --> 00:10:05.470 his bedroom, but also sort of prophetic. Totally. 00:10:05.570 --> 00:10:07.450 And let's talk about that recording setup, because 00:10:07.450 --> 00:10:09.409 this is the birth of the SoundCloud aesthetic. 00:10:09.750 --> 00:10:12.230 He wasn't going to professional studios in downtown 00:10:12.230 --> 00:10:14.350 Chicago. He was using his phone, right. Literally 00:10:14.350 --> 00:10:17.389 his smartphone. He would find beats online, often 00:10:17.389 --> 00:10:19.950 leasing them for $20 or $30 from producers he 00:10:19.950 --> 00:10:22.309 met on the internet, and he would record his 00:10:22.309 --> 00:10:25.210 vocals directly into the phone. Sometimes he'd 00:10:25.210 --> 00:10:27.129 use the white Apple headphones with the little 00:10:27.129 --> 00:10:30.570 microphone on the cord. That explains that gritty, 00:10:30.570 --> 00:10:34.250 slightly distorted, almost lo -fi sound that 00:10:34.250 --> 00:10:36.889 became his signature. Exactly. In high -fidelity 00:10:36.889 --> 00:10:40.090 audio, distortion is a mistake. In SoundCloud 00:10:40.090 --> 00:10:42.549 rap, distortion is an emotion. It sounds raw. 00:10:42.629 --> 00:10:44.889 It sounds urgent. It sounds like he is right 00:10:44.889 --> 00:10:47.090 next to you, whispering in your ear or screaming 00:10:47.090 --> 00:10:49.370 in his car. So he is uploading these tracks. 00:10:49.610 --> 00:10:53.789 He graduates high school in 2017. And now he 00:10:53.789 --> 00:10:56.549 hits that classic crossroads, the what do you 00:10:56.549 --> 00:10:58.490 do with your life moment that everyone faces. 00:10:58.690 --> 00:11:01.029 He needed money. Music wasn't paying the bills 00:11:01.029 --> 00:11:04.399 yet. So he gets a job. A factory job. a car parts 00:11:04.399 --> 00:11:06.940 factory, I believe. And this is my favorite detail 00:11:06.940 --> 00:11:09.419 of his brief fame life because it is so relatable. 00:11:09.580 --> 00:11:12.480 He lasted exactly two weeks. He realized immediately, 00:11:12.620 --> 00:11:15.980 I am not built for this. He was dissatisfied, 00:11:16.139 --> 00:11:18.080 maybe a bit depressed by the monotony of it. 00:11:18.159 --> 00:11:20.259 He essentially got himself fired or just walked 00:11:20.259 --> 00:11:23.440 out so he could focus 100 % on music. That is 00:11:23.440 --> 00:11:26.240 a terrifying leap of faith. to look at a steady, 00:11:26.320 --> 00:11:28.720 if boring, paycheck and say, no, I'm going to 00:11:28.720 --> 00:11:30.639 bet on my voice memos. It is, but it paid off 00:11:30.639 --> 00:11:33.340 almost instantly. He joined this internet collective 00:11:33.340 --> 00:11:35.840 called Internet Money. Which is huge in the producer 00:11:35.840 --> 00:11:39.059 world. Run by Taz Taylor and Nick Mira. Massive. 00:11:39.100 --> 00:11:41.720 It is a hub for beat makers and artists. It gave 00:11:41.720 --> 00:11:43.500 him a community. It gave him access to better 00:11:43.500 --> 00:11:46.879 beats. And in June 2017, he releases his debut 00:11:46.879 --> 00:11:51.940 EP, 999. 999. That number became his logo. He 00:11:51.940 --> 00:11:54.559 had it tattooed. It was on his merch. What did 00:11:54.559 --> 00:11:58.379 it mean? It is an inversion of 666. If 666 is 00:11:58.379 --> 00:12:00.799 the mark of the beast of evil, of negativity, 00:12:01.139 --> 00:12:03.960 999 is taking whatever bad situation you're in, 00:12:04.039 --> 00:12:06.039 whatever demons you have, and flipping them into 00:12:06.039 --> 00:12:07.899 something positive. That was his entire philosophy. 00:12:08.039 --> 00:12:10.600 It was. And that EP had a song on it, a song 00:12:10.600 --> 00:12:12.259 that would change everything. It was called Lucid 00:12:12.259 --> 00:12:15.519 Dreams. Which brings us to section two, The Meteoric 00:12:15.519 --> 00:12:20.179 Rise, 2018. The year the world caught fire. If 00:12:20.179 --> 00:12:22.740 2017 was the simmer, 2018 was the explosion. 00:12:22.960 --> 00:12:25.360 It all happened so fast. So walk us through the 00:12:25.360 --> 00:12:28.120 mechanics of this rise. Because it doesn't start 00:12:28.120 --> 00:12:29.899 with a record label. It starts with a blog, right? 00:12:30.019 --> 00:12:31.980 It starts with Lyrical Lemonade. And a guy named 00:12:31.980 --> 00:12:34.820 Cole Bennett. We have to explain Cole Bennett 00:12:34.820 --> 00:12:37.440 to you if you aren't deep in this world. In 2018, 00:12:37.720 --> 00:12:40.379 if you were a rapper, Cole Bennett wasn't just 00:12:40.379 --> 00:12:43.100 a video director. He was a kingmaker. A tastemaker. 00:12:43.200 --> 00:12:45.940 He ran a blog and a YouTube channel called Lyrical 00:12:45.940 --> 00:12:48.820 Lemonade. His videos had a very specific style. 00:12:49.539 --> 00:12:51.919 Colorful, trippy, with cartoonish effects and 00:12:51.919 --> 00:12:54.659 quick edits. If he directed your video, you were 00:12:54.659 --> 00:12:56.879 guaranteed millions of views. It was like a cheat 00:12:56.879 --> 00:12:58.759 code for the music industry. It was a guaranteed 00:12:58.759 --> 00:13:01.779 cosign. So Juice releases an EP called Nothing's 00:13:01.779 --> 00:13:05.399 Different in late 2017. It has a song on it called 00:13:05.399 --> 00:13:08.019 All Girls Are the Same. Lyrical Lemonade picks 00:13:08.019 --> 00:13:10.299 it up. Cole Bennett reaches out. They shoot the 00:13:10.299 --> 00:13:13.460 video in February 2018. And I've seen that video. 00:13:13.850 --> 00:13:16.769 It is so simple, but it is so charismatic. It's 00:13:16.769 --> 00:13:19.269 just him in this trippy room and you can't take 00:13:19.269 --> 00:13:21.889 your eyes off him. And the industry reaction 00:13:21.889 --> 00:13:25.710 was instantaneous. A bidding war started. Every 00:13:25.710 --> 00:13:28.269 major label wanted him. And Interscope Records 00:13:28.269 --> 00:13:31.570 won. For $3 million. I want to be the skeptic 00:13:31.570 --> 00:13:35.210 here for a second. $3 million. For a 19 -year 00:13:35.210 --> 00:13:38.340 -old kid with a couple of SoundCloud hits. Does 00:13:38.340 --> 00:13:42.500 that make business sense? In 2018, yes. Because 00:13:42.500 --> 00:13:44.940 streaming was taking over, the labels realized 00:13:44.940 --> 00:13:49.139 that these kids on SoundCloud had built in fanatical 00:13:49.139 --> 00:13:51.759 fan bases. They didn't need radio play. They 00:13:51.759 --> 00:13:53.820 didn't need MTV. They already had the numbers. 00:13:53.840 --> 00:13:56.450 So Interscope wasn't paying for potential. No, 00:13:56.529 --> 00:13:58.230 they were buying an existing movement. They were 00:13:58.230 --> 00:14:00.350 buying a sure thing. And then they officially 00:14:00.350 --> 00:14:02.970 re -released Lucid Dreams as a single in May. 00:14:03.110 --> 00:14:05.190 And it becomes ubiquitous. It was everywhere. 00:14:05.350 --> 00:14:07.289 It peaked at number two on the Billboard Hot 00:14:07.289 --> 00:14:11.029 100. By January 2020, it had over a billion streams 00:14:11.029 --> 00:14:13.450 on Spotify alone. Let's break down Lucid Dreams 00:14:13.450 --> 00:14:15.850 musically. Right. Why did it work? Why did it 00:14:15.850 --> 00:14:18.710 cross over from hip -hop fans to pop fans to 00:14:18.710 --> 00:14:21.509 rock fans? It is the perfect synthesis of all 00:14:21.509 --> 00:14:23.370 his influences we just talked about. It's all 00:14:23.370 --> 00:14:25.409 there. It's built around a sample of Sting's... 00:14:25.519 --> 00:14:29.679 Which is a beautiful, melancholic, very sophisticated 00:14:29.679 --> 00:14:32.299 guitar riff. Right. So you have this classic 00:14:32.299 --> 00:14:35.519 adult contemporary pop sample, but then the producer, 00:14:35.700 --> 00:14:38.120 Nick Mira from Internet Money, puts these rattling 00:14:38.120 --> 00:14:40.879 trap hi -hats and a Fivvy 808 bass under it. 00:14:41.039 --> 00:14:43.720 So it is rock meets trap, pop meets hip -hop. 00:14:43.879 --> 00:14:46.159 And then Juice's vocal. He isn't rapping in a 00:14:46.159 --> 00:14:50.200 monotone. He is wailing. I still see your shadows 00:14:50.200 --> 00:14:54.080 in my room. It is pure, distilled teenage angst. 00:14:54.379 --> 00:14:56.840 it resonated with everyone who had ever had a 00:14:56.840 --> 00:14:59.000 breakup now this is the part that blows my mind 00:14:59.000 --> 00:15:01.399 we have the hit song we have the debut album 00:15:01.399 --> 00:15:02.940 goodbye and good riddance which comes out in 00:15:02.940 --> 00:15:06.539 may 2018 but the way he made these songs tell 00:15:06.539 --> 00:15:08.909 us about the no writing rule This is the key 00:15:08.909 --> 00:15:11.149 insight into his genius, and it's something people 00:15:11.149 --> 00:15:13.750 really struggle to comprehend. Higgins stated 00:15:13.750 --> 00:15:16.070 later that Lucid Dreams was the only track on 00:15:16.070 --> 00:15:17.970 that entire album that he wrote down on paper 00:15:17.970 --> 00:15:20.029 or in his phone. The only one. Out of the whole 00:15:20.029 --> 00:15:22.429 album, all those hits. The only one. Every other 00:15:22.429 --> 00:15:25.110 song, All Girls Are the Same, Lean With Me, Wasted, 00:15:25.149 --> 00:15:28.190 was done impromptu, freestyled. Explain that 00:15:28.190 --> 00:15:30.289 process to me, because when I think of freestyling, 00:15:30.289 --> 00:15:32.509 I think of someone at a party trying to rhyme 00:15:32.509 --> 00:15:37.100 cat with bat and stumbling. This is fully structured 00:15:37.100 --> 00:15:40.700 songwriting with choruses versus bridges. It 00:15:40.700 --> 00:15:42.860 is a process called punching in. He would go 00:15:42.860 --> 00:15:44.720 into the booth. The producer plays the beat. 00:15:44.899 --> 00:15:47.580 Juice listens for maybe 30 seconds, just gets 00:15:47.580 --> 00:15:49.779 a feel for it. Then he tells the engineer to 00:15:49.779 --> 00:15:52.720 hit record. He does two lines, stops. The engineer 00:15:52.720 --> 00:15:54.980 keeps it. He listens back, thinks for a second, 00:15:55.080 --> 00:15:58.139 then does the next two lines, stops. So he is 00:15:58.139 --> 00:16:00.960 building the song brick by brick in real time. 00:16:01.430 --> 00:16:04.169 Exactly. He is composing the melody, the lyrics, 00:16:04.269 --> 00:16:06.450 the flow, and the harmonies simultaneously off 00:16:06.450 --> 00:16:08.649 the top of his head. He said if he was alone, 00:16:08.830 --> 00:16:10.690 he'd do it into his voice memo so he wouldn't 00:16:10.690 --> 00:16:13.570 forget the idea. So he is composing and performing 00:16:13.570 --> 00:16:16.750 at the exact same time. Yes. It is a pure flow 00:16:16.750 --> 00:16:19.009 state. He described it as just letting the emotion 00:16:19.009 --> 00:16:21.250 out without a filter. If he stopped to write 00:16:21.250 --> 00:16:23.389 it down, he felt he would overthink it. He felt 00:16:23.389 --> 00:16:25.929 it would lose its purity. That requires a level 00:16:25.929 --> 00:16:28.610 of cognitive processing speed that is actually 00:16:28.610 --> 00:16:31.059 scary. It's like his brain was a supercomputer 00:16:31.059 --> 00:16:34.340 for melody. It is why he was so prolific. Most 00:16:34.340 --> 00:16:36.639 artists take weeks to write a song. Juice could 00:16:36.639 --> 00:16:39.379 record five, six, seven fully finished songs 00:16:39.379 --> 00:16:42.279 in a single night. But 2018 wasn't just a victory 00:16:42.279 --> 00:16:45.000 lap. It was also a year of tragedy for the specific 00:16:45.000 --> 00:16:47.940 community he was part of. The SoundCloud scene 00:16:47.940 --> 00:16:51.639 was incredibly fragile. In November 2017, just 00:16:51.639 --> 00:16:54.399 as Juice was starting to bubble, Lil Peep... 00:16:54.559 --> 00:16:56.960 died of an overdose. Who was arguably the pioneer 00:16:56.960 --> 00:17:00.080 of this emo rap sound. He was. He laid the groundwork. 00:17:00.259 --> 00:17:03.740 And then in June 2018, right after Goodbye and 00:17:03.740 --> 00:17:06.720 Good Riddance came out, XXXTentacion was murdered 00:17:06.720 --> 00:17:08.980 in Florida. And Juice knew them, right? Or at 00:17:08.980 --> 00:17:11.079 least knew of them. He looked up to them. He 00:17:11.079 --> 00:17:13.400 was becoming friends with X. The sources say 00:17:13.400 --> 00:17:15.059 they were actually planning to meet up for the 00:17:15.059 --> 00:17:18.180 first time. Wow. So when X died, Juice released 00:17:18.180 --> 00:17:21.670 a two -song EP called Too Soon. It was an immediate 00:17:21.670 --> 00:17:24.490 reaction. The cover art was literally a screenshot 00:17:24.490 --> 00:17:27.230 of his text messages with ex -excentation talking 00:17:27.230 --> 00:17:29.470 about supporting each other. That is so raw. 00:17:29.589 --> 00:17:31.690 It is like grieving in real time on the internet 00:17:31.690 --> 00:17:33.789 for millions of people to see. And that brings 00:17:33.789 --> 00:17:36.170 us to the genre itself. We keep saying emo rap. 00:17:36.390 --> 00:17:39.930 In 2018, Spotify named it the fastest growing 00:17:39.930 --> 00:17:42.950 genre on its platform. But what is it, really? 00:17:43.269 --> 00:17:46.450 Yeah, because to an older listener, emo means 00:17:46.450 --> 00:17:50.049 My Chemical Romance or Fall Out Boy. And rap 00:17:50.049 --> 00:17:52.910 means Tupac. Mixing them sounds like oil and 00:17:52.910 --> 00:17:55.130 water. But musically, it makes perfect sense. 00:17:55.210 --> 00:17:57.710 Both genres are about high emotion. Both are 00:17:57.710 --> 00:18:00.329 about being an outsider. Both are about heartbreak. 00:18:00.789 --> 00:18:03.109 Juice WRLD was the bridge. He took the aesthetics 00:18:03.109 --> 00:18:05.349 of emo, the vocal melodies, the lyrics about 00:18:05.349 --> 00:18:07.849 depression, the singing, and put them over trap 00:18:07.849 --> 00:18:10.369 beats. Did he like the label? Did he want to 00:18:10.369 --> 00:18:12.750 be called an emo rapper? He had a nuanced take 00:18:12.750 --> 00:18:15.190 on it. On one hand, he didn't want to be boxed 00:18:15.190 --> 00:18:17.750 in. He famously said, I don't make emo rap, I 00:18:17.750 --> 00:18:20.049 make music. But he also acknowledged the core 00:18:20.049 --> 00:18:22.349 truth of it. He believed music needed to be dark 00:18:22.349 --> 00:18:24.690 because, in his words, the world isn't a light 00:18:24.690 --> 00:18:27.029 or happy place. He wasn't trying to sell a party 00:18:27.029 --> 00:18:29.849 fantasy? No. Even his upbeat songs have this 00:18:29.849 --> 00:18:32.869 undercurrent of sadness or anxiety to them. We 00:18:32.869 --> 00:18:35.400 talked about his rock influences. But his hip 00:18:35.400 --> 00:18:37.440 hop influences are interesting, too. He cited 00:18:37.440 --> 00:18:40.740 Kanye West as a major one. Specifically the album 00:18:40.740 --> 00:18:43.740 808s and Heartbreak. Which came out in 2008 when 00:18:43.740 --> 00:18:46.160 Juice was, what, 10 years old? Yeah. And Juice 00:18:46.160 --> 00:18:49.000 called Kanye a time traveler for making that 00:18:49.000 --> 00:18:52.180 album. Because if you listen to 808s today, the 00:18:52.180 --> 00:18:54.779 heavy auto -tune singing, the raw vulnerability, 00:18:55.160 --> 00:18:58.160 the focus on loss and heartbreak. It basically 00:18:58.160 --> 00:19:01.559 predicted Juice WRLD's entire career 10 years 00:19:01.559 --> 00:19:03.640 early. It laid the blueprint. It absolutely did. 00:19:03.759 --> 00:19:06.720 And Juice took that blueprint and added the punk 00:19:06.720 --> 00:19:09.799 rock ethos of Billy Idol and the grit of Chief 00:19:09.799 --> 00:19:12.160 Keef. It was a unique cocktail. Let's talk about 00:19:12.160 --> 00:19:13.779 the lyrical themes, because this is where the 00:19:13.779 --> 00:19:15.559 connection with the audience really happened. 00:19:15.779 --> 00:19:18.039 He wasn't just rapping about how much money he 00:19:18.039 --> 00:19:20.240 had. Well, sometimes he was. But mostly he was 00:19:20.240 --> 00:19:22.440 rapping about how much he was hurting. Vulnerability 00:19:22.440 --> 00:19:24.799 is the key word. He talked about addiction not 00:19:24.799 --> 00:19:28.160 as a cool party trick, but as a case. as a trap 00:19:28.160 --> 00:19:30.640 he couldn't escape. The song Lean Wit Me is the 00:19:30.640 --> 00:19:33.039 perfect example of this. It is almost a public 00:19:33.039 --> 00:19:35.569 service announcement set to a trap beat. The 00:19:35.569 --> 00:19:38.170 music video is literally him at an Alcoholics 00:19:38.170 --> 00:19:40.849 Anonymous meeting. He sings, told her if I die, 00:19:40.890 --> 00:19:43.190 I'ma die young. He was hyper aware of his own 00:19:43.190 --> 00:19:45.789 mortality. And that is the thing that makes listening 00:19:45.789 --> 00:19:49.190 to him now so difficult. He was telling us what 00:19:49.190 --> 00:19:51.109 was going to happen. He was screaming it from 00:19:51.109 --> 00:19:53.390 the rooftops. He was turning his struggle into 00:19:53.390 --> 00:19:56.470 art that millions of kids could relate to, hoping 00:19:56.470 --> 00:19:58.549 it would help them, even if he couldn't save 00:19:58.549 --> 00:20:01.029 himself. And before we move on, I want to emphasize 00:20:01.029 --> 00:20:03.589 that his freestyling wasn't just for the studio. 00:20:03.789 --> 00:20:06.269 He would go on. radio shows, Tim Westwood in 00:20:06.269 --> 00:20:09.410 the UK, Funk Flex in New York, and just go for 00:20:09.410 --> 00:20:12.009 an hour straight. Over classic boom bap beats, 00:20:12.289 --> 00:20:16.329 Eminem beats, Nas beats, he proved he could wrap 00:20:16.329 --> 00:20:20.170 circles around traditional MCs. He valued that 00:20:20.170 --> 00:20:23.109 duality being the sad boy singer for his albums 00:20:23.109 --> 00:20:25.869 and the lyrical monster on the radio. He had 00:20:25.869 --> 00:20:27.809 to prove he was the complete package. He did. 00:20:27.890 --> 00:20:29.609 He shut up all the critics who said he couldn't 00:20:29.609 --> 00:20:32.049 really rap. So we move into the height of his 00:20:32.049 --> 00:20:36.109 fame. 2018 turns into 2019. He is arguably the 00:20:36.109 --> 00:20:39.150 biggest new artist in the world. He is inescapable. 00:20:39.250 --> 00:20:41.589 He drops a collaborative mixtape with Future 00:20:41.589 --> 00:20:44.329 called World on Drugs. Which is a huge cosign. 00:20:44.470 --> 00:20:47.410 Future's a titan of the genre. Exactly. Then 00:20:47.410 --> 00:20:50.309 he's on No Bystanders with Travis Scott on Astroworld, 00:20:50.349 --> 00:20:52.349 one of the biggest albums of the decade. He's 00:20:52.349 --> 00:20:54.410 collaborating with BTS, the biggest band in the 00:20:54.410 --> 00:20:58.130 world, with RM and Suga. He's working with Ellie 00:20:58.130 --> 00:21:01.220 Goulding and Benny Blanco on pop hits. He is 00:21:01.220 --> 00:21:04.819 crossing over into pop, K -pop, electronic. And 00:21:04.819 --> 00:21:07.700 he goes on tour with Nicki Minaj. The Nicki World 00:21:07.700 --> 00:21:10.700 Tour, a massive European arena tour. He was her 00:21:10.700 --> 00:21:12.819 co -headliner. And this is where we have to talk 00:21:12.819 --> 00:21:15.480 about the lifestyle. Because the pressure of 00:21:15.480 --> 00:21:18.019 touring, I don't think people realize what that 00:21:18.019 --> 00:21:20.519 does to a person physically and mentally. It 00:21:20.519 --> 00:21:22.940 is absolutely grueling. You are in a different 00:21:22.940 --> 00:21:25.200 city every night. You are performing for thousands 00:21:25.200 --> 00:21:27.400 of people, giving them all your energy. Then 00:21:27.400 --> 00:21:29.720 you get on a bus or a plane. You don't sleep. 00:21:29.799 --> 00:21:32.180 Your body clock is a mess. And if you are already 00:21:32.180 --> 00:21:34.940 struggling with anxiety and addiction. The drugs. 00:21:35.609 --> 00:21:37.730 Become the only way to cope. They become a tool 00:21:37.730 --> 00:21:39.990 for the job. You take uppers to get on stage, 00:21:40.130 --> 00:21:42.789 downers to sleep. It is a vicious, vicious cycle. 00:21:42.990 --> 00:21:45.369 His personal life was also incredibly complicated 00:21:45.369 --> 00:21:47.450 during this time. He was living in Los Angeles 00:21:47.450 --> 00:21:49.549 with his girlfriend, Allie Lottie. They had a 00:21:49.549 --> 00:21:51.789 very intense, very public relationship. You could 00:21:51.789 --> 00:21:53.609 see it all on Instagram. They were always together. 00:21:54.470 --> 00:21:57.529 But there was deep tragedy there, too, behind 00:21:57.529 --> 00:22:00.210 the scenes. The sources mention this, and it's 00:22:00.210 --> 00:22:02.990 just awful. Lottie revealed later in interviews 00:22:02.990 --> 00:22:05.750 that she was pregnant with Higgins' baby on three 00:22:05.750 --> 00:22:08.690 separate occasions. Three times. Three times. 00:22:08.829 --> 00:22:12.430 And all three resulted in miscarriages. My God. 00:22:12.650 --> 00:22:15.789 She attributed it to the stress of their lifestyles, 00:22:15.809 --> 00:22:18.549 the constant movement, the chaos, the drugs. 00:22:18.869 --> 00:22:21.690 Imagine dealing with that level of grief while 00:22:21.690 --> 00:22:24.210 having to smile for cameras every day and perform 00:22:24.210 --> 00:22:27.269 for 20 ,000 people. It's an unimaginable amount 00:22:27.269 --> 00:22:29.920 of pressure. And the addiction was ramping up. 00:22:29.940 --> 00:22:31.380 Everyone around him could see it. He was getting 00:22:31.380 --> 00:22:33.960 out of control. But here is the glimmer of hope 00:22:33.960 --> 00:22:36.339 that makes the end so much more bitter. The sources 00:22:36.339 --> 00:22:38.240 note that Higgins had actually agreed to go to 00:22:38.240 --> 00:22:40.839 rehab. He was going to go. Yes. His team had 00:22:40.839 --> 00:22:43.420 intervened. He had agreed to it just weeks prior 00:22:43.420 --> 00:22:46.259 to his death. He knew he was in too deep. He 00:22:46.259 --> 00:22:48.339 wanted to get clean. But he never made it. He 00:22:48.339 --> 00:22:51.319 never made it. That brings us to December 8, 00:22:51.559 --> 00:22:55.380 2019, the day everything stopped. It is a timeline 00:22:55.380 --> 00:22:57.680 that has been scrutinized heavily through police 00:22:57.680 --> 00:23:00.420 reports and witness interviews. Higgins was aboard 00:23:00.420 --> 00:23:03.740 a private Gulfstream jet. They were flying from 00:23:03.740 --> 00:23:06.460 Van Moys Airport in Los Angeles back home to 00:23:06.460 --> 00:23:08.640 Chicago. He was heading home for his birthday 00:23:08.640 --> 00:23:11.259 party, essentially, a delayed celebration. He 00:23:11.259 --> 00:23:14.660 had just turned 21 on December 2nd. So he was 00:23:14.660 --> 00:23:18.039 six days into being 21 years old. But this wasn't 00:23:18.039 --> 00:23:20.099 a normal flight. Law enforcement was waiting 00:23:20.099 --> 00:23:22.740 for them. No. Federal agents had been notified 00:23:22.740 --> 00:23:25.400 that there were suspected guns and drugs on board. 00:23:25.559 --> 00:23:27.920 We don't know exactly who tipped them off. The 00:23:27.920 --> 00:23:30.559 sources suggest it was the pilot, which is standard 00:23:30.559 --> 00:23:33.480 procedure if they see illegal activity. But the 00:23:33.480 --> 00:23:35.980 police were waiting at Midway Airport. So the 00:23:35.980 --> 00:23:38.799 plane lands. They taxi to a private hangar. Yeah. 00:23:38.920 --> 00:23:40.940 And the police are there. They board the plane. 00:23:41.079 --> 00:23:43.539 They start searching luggage. And they find a 00:23:43.539 --> 00:23:47.099 lot. 70 pounds of marijuana. 32 kilograms. Vacuum 00:23:47.099 --> 00:23:49.700 -sealed bags in multiple suitcases, along with 00:23:49.700 --> 00:23:51.619 several handguns and high -capacity magazines. 00:23:52.019 --> 00:23:54.779 Now, 70 pounds. That is not for personal use. 00:23:54.859 --> 00:23:56.599 That is a significant amount that's a trafficking 00:23:56.599 --> 00:23:59.839 charge. It is. But that is a legal issue. That 00:23:59.839 --> 00:24:02.819 is not a fatal issue. His security guards were 00:24:02.819 --> 00:24:04.579 likely going to take the charge for the guns. 00:24:04.720 --> 00:24:06.240 He probably would have gotten a fine for the 00:24:06.240 --> 00:24:09.619 weed. No. The fatality comes from what happened 00:24:09.619 --> 00:24:11.819 during the search. According to witnesses from 00:24:11.819 --> 00:24:14.339 his team and the police reports, while the agents 00:24:14.339 --> 00:24:17.180 were searching the bags, Higgins took and swallowed 00:24:17.180 --> 00:24:19.579 several pills. The narrative has always been 00:24:19.579 --> 00:24:21.519 that he swallowed them to hide them from the 00:24:21.519 --> 00:24:23.960 cops? Yeah. Is that true? That was the initial 00:24:23.960 --> 00:24:26.119 theory, panic swallowing. It seemed logical. 00:24:26.680 --> 00:24:29.619 But his videographer, Chris Long, who was on 00:24:29.619 --> 00:24:32.380 the plane, disputed that later. He said Juice 00:24:32.380 --> 00:24:34.380 didn't care about the police finding a few pills 00:24:34.380 --> 00:24:37.180 when they already had 70 pounds of weed. He implied 00:24:37.180 --> 00:24:40.509 it was just usage. Or maybe a mix of panic and 00:24:40.509 --> 00:24:42.509 addiction. We'll never know his exact intent. 00:24:42.809 --> 00:24:46.089 But we know the pills were Percocet. Yes. Multiple 00:24:46.089 --> 00:24:49.369 Percocet pills. A powerful opioid. And the biological 00:24:49.369 --> 00:24:53.049 result is not up for debate. No. He started convulsing. 00:24:53.049 --> 00:24:55.470 He went into a seizure right there on the tarmac 00:24:55.470 --> 00:24:57.450 inside the hangar. Did they try to save him? 00:24:57.609 --> 00:25:00.170 They did. The federal agents actually administered 00:25:00.170 --> 00:25:02.450 Narcan, which they carry for situations like 00:25:02.450 --> 00:25:06.759 this. Narcan is the overdose reversal drug. Naloxone. 00:25:06.839 --> 00:25:09.579 Right. They gave him two doses. And according 00:25:09.579 --> 00:25:12.279 to the reports, he did wake up briefly, but he 00:25:12.279 --> 00:25:14.859 was incoherent. He was immediately transported 00:25:14.859 --> 00:25:17.299 to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oakland. 00:25:17.660 --> 00:25:21.279 And he was pronounced dead. At 3 .14 a .m. Just 00:25:21.279 --> 00:25:24.519 gone. The autopsy report came out later. What 00:25:24.519 --> 00:25:27.960 was the official cause? Toxic levels of oxycodone 00:25:27.960 --> 00:25:30.660 and codeine in his system. It was ruled an accidental 00:25:30.660 --> 00:25:33.779 overdose. The reaction from the music world was... 00:25:34.569 --> 00:25:36.650 It was just a gut punch. It was like the air 00:25:36.650 --> 00:25:39.130 was sucked out of the room. Drake, The Weeknd, 00:25:39.329 --> 00:25:41.970 Chance the Rapper, everyone posted tributes immediately. 00:25:42.430 --> 00:25:44.269 It felt like the entire industry stopped for 00:25:44.269 --> 00:25:46.329 a day. I remember there was some anger, too. 00:25:46.670 --> 00:25:48.769 Rapper Boosie Badazz went on this rant. Yeah, 00:25:48.809 --> 00:25:51.069 Boosie blamed the pilot. He called him a snitch. 00:25:51.150 --> 00:25:53.130 He basically said if the pilot hadn't called 00:25:53.130 --> 00:25:55.130 the cops, Juice wouldn't have panicked and he 00:25:55.130 --> 00:25:57.440 wouldn't be dead. He later walked that back, 00:25:57.599 --> 00:25:59.420 realizing it's more complex, but it showed how 00:25:59.420 --> 00:26:01.660 angry people were. They wanted someone to blame 00:26:01.660 --> 00:26:04.140 for an unspeakable tragedy. And then there was 00:26:04.140 --> 00:26:06.920 the eeriness of his own lyrics. It was inescapable. 00:26:07.059 --> 00:26:09.640 The song Legends. He wrote it in memory of Lil 00:26:09.640 --> 00:26:13.079 Peep and XX Tentation. What's the 27 Club? We 00:26:13.079 --> 00:26:15.440 ain't making it past 21. It is one of the most 00:26:15.440 --> 00:26:18.079 haunting, prophetic lines in modern music history. 00:26:18.259 --> 00:26:21.130 He didn't just sing it, he lived it. and died 00:26:21.130 --> 00:26:23.569 by it. So Jared Higgins is gone. But this brings 00:26:23.569 --> 00:26:26.230 us to the final and perhaps most complex part 00:26:26.230 --> 00:26:29.630 of our deep dive, the aftermath. Because Juice 00:26:29.630 --> 00:26:33.809 WRLD, the artist, he didn't stop. In fact, commercially, 00:26:34.029 --> 00:26:36.609 he got bigger, much bigger. Let's look at the 00:26:36.609 --> 00:26:39.309 first posthumous album, Legends Never Die, released 00:26:39.309 --> 00:26:42.059 in July 2020. The numbers are staggering. It 00:26:42.059 --> 00:26:44.240 debuted at number one. That was expected. But 00:26:44.240 --> 00:26:46.759 listen to this. Five songs from that album were 00:26:46.759 --> 00:26:49.700 in the Billboard Hot 100 top 10 simultaneously. 00:26:50.019 --> 00:26:52.799 Dive at once in the top 10. Yes. The only other 00:26:52.799 --> 00:26:54.539 artists to ever do that in the history of the 00:26:54.539 --> 00:26:56.920 chart are the Beatles and Drake. That puts him 00:26:56.920 --> 00:26:59.700 in the rarest of air. That's God tier. In 2020, 00:26:59.819 --> 00:27:01.839 the year after he died, he was streamed over 00:27:01.839 --> 00:27:05.579 5 .9 billion times on Spotify. He was the fourth 00:27:05.579 --> 00:27:08.480 most streamed artist globally, above many living 00:27:08.480 --> 00:27:10.849 superstars. Why? Why did the popularity grow 00:27:10.849 --> 00:27:13.349 so much after the death? I think the death validated 00:27:13.349 --> 00:27:16.309 the lyrics. When he was alive and he sang about 00:27:16.309 --> 00:27:18.869 dying young, it was sad, it was art. When he 00:27:18.869 --> 00:27:21.329 actually died young, those songs became sacred 00:27:21.329 --> 00:27:24.470 texts. They became prophecies. Fans felt like 00:27:24.470 --> 00:27:26.809 he died for them in a weird way. He was the martyr 00:27:26.809 --> 00:27:29.170 of their generation's anxiety. And the estate 00:27:29.170 --> 00:27:31.740 run by his mother and the record label? has kept 00:27:31.740 --> 00:27:33.880 the content coming there's another album fighting 00:27:33.880 --> 00:27:37.420 demons in december 2021 this one was tied to 00:27:37.420 --> 00:27:40.880 an hbo documentary juice world into the abyss 00:27:40.880 --> 00:27:43.500 i saw that it is incredibly hard to watch it 00:27:43.500 --> 00:27:46.160 is it uses tons of archival behind -the -scenes 00:27:46.160 --> 00:27:49.299 footage to show the drug use in graphic unflinching 00:27:49.299 --> 00:27:51.819 detail it doesn't glamorize it at all it's a 00:27:51.819 --> 00:27:54.200 very stark look at his mental health struggles 00:27:54.200 --> 00:27:57.029 and the releases just keep coming Girl of My 00:27:57.029 --> 00:27:59.690 Dreams with Suga from BTS got him his first number 00:27:59.690 --> 00:28:02.349 one on the digital song sales chart. And they've 00:28:02.349 --> 00:28:04.769 announced a final studio album, The Party Never 00:28:04.769 --> 00:28:08.509 Ends. And even recently, late 2024, they are 00:28:08.509 --> 00:28:10.910 still innovating the Fortnite collaboration. 00:28:11.430 --> 00:28:14.349 This is fascinating to me. Epic Games added Juice 00:28:14.349 --> 00:28:16.829 WRLD as a playable character, a skin, in Fortnite. 00:28:16.910 --> 00:28:19.609 They did a virtual concert inside the game. Some 00:28:19.609 --> 00:28:23.119 people find that dystopian. A digital ghost performing 00:28:23.119 --> 00:28:25.559 for kids in a video game. It is a big black mirror. 00:28:25.779 --> 00:28:27.700 It is. But you can also see the other side of 00:28:27.700 --> 00:28:30.259 it. It introduces him to a 12 -year -old today 00:28:30.259 --> 00:28:32.059 who might have been too young to know him in 00:28:32.059 --> 00:28:35.500 2018. It keeps the legacy alive for a new generation. 00:28:36.019 --> 00:28:39.460 But amidst all the commerce, the skins, the streams, 00:28:39.700 --> 00:28:42.460 the posthumous albums, there is one part of the 00:28:42.460 --> 00:28:46.740 legacy that feels truly pure. The live free 999 00:28:46.740 --> 00:28:50.180 fund. This is his mother's work, Carmella Wallace. 00:28:50.750 --> 00:28:52.789 Tell us about that. She established the funds 00:28:52.789 --> 00:28:55.849 to support programs for young, underserved populations, 00:28:56.049 --> 00:28:58.329 specifically focusing on addiction, anxiety, 00:28:58.609 --> 00:29:00.950 and depression. She's using the profits from 00:29:00.950 --> 00:29:03.329 his estate to fund this. She could have hidden 00:29:03.329 --> 00:29:05.150 the cause of death. She could have said heart 00:29:05.150 --> 00:29:07.470 failure to avoid the stigma. A lot of families 00:29:07.470 --> 00:29:10.269 do. Right. But she didn't. She leaned into it. 00:29:10.569 --> 00:29:12.789 Her goal is to normalize the conversation about 00:29:12.789 --> 00:29:14.849 mental health and addiction. She wants to say, 00:29:14.930 --> 00:29:16.769 my son struggled, and if you are struggling, 00:29:16.990 --> 00:29:19.670 it is okay to get help. It is about turning that 00:29:19.670 --> 00:29:23.009 999 concept into real world action. It's an incredible 00:29:23.009 --> 00:29:26.450 act of grace, really. So as we wrap up, we have 00:29:26.450 --> 00:29:30.190 looked at a life that was short, fast, brilliant, 00:29:30.349 --> 00:29:34.210 and tragic. The ultimate paradox. A kid who wasn't 00:29:34.210 --> 00:29:36.730 allowed to listen to hip hop, who ended up changing 00:29:36.730 --> 00:29:39.130 the sound of hip hop forever. He made it okay 00:29:39.130 --> 00:29:41.670 to be vulnerable. That is the key takeaway, I 00:29:41.670 --> 00:29:44.049 think. He told the toughest kids in the room 00:29:44.049 --> 00:29:46.609 that it was okay to cry. He gave a voice to a 00:29:46.609 --> 00:29:49.349 generation's pain. I want to leave you with a 00:29:49.349 --> 00:29:51.109 provocative thought, something for you to chew 00:29:51.109 --> 00:29:53.990 on. We talked about his process, the freestyling, 00:29:54.029 --> 00:29:56.769 the no writing. Because of that workflow, he 00:29:56.769 --> 00:29:59.349 was a machine. Reports and leaks suggest there 00:29:59.349 --> 00:30:01.549 are thousands of unreleased Juice WRLD songs 00:30:01.549 --> 00:30:03.970 in a vault somewhere. Just sitting on hard drives, 00:30:04.190 --> 00:30:07.150 complete songs, rough demos, voice memos. In 00:30:07.150 --> 00:30:09.920 this new era of AI. where we can recreate voices 00:30:09.920 --> 00:30:12.160 with perfect clarity and with this massive backlog 00:30:12.160 --> 00:30:15.259 of unfinished demos, who gets to decide what 00:30:15.259 --> 00:30:18.000 is a Juice WRLD song now? It is the great ethical 00:30:18.000 --> 00:30:20.160 dilemma of the modern music industry, and he 00:30:20.160 --> 00:30:22.279 is case study number one. Do we let a producer 00:30:22.279 --> 00:30:24.619 finish a beat? Do we let an AI clean up a vocal? 00:30:24.920 --> 00:30:27.420 Are we honoring the dead by finishing their work? 00:30:27.579 --> 00:30:30.140 Or are we just consuming them? If he didn't put 00:30:30.140 --> 00:30:32.220 his final stamp on it, if he didn't say, it's 00:30:32.220 --> 00:30:36.740 done, is it art? Or is it just content? That 00:30:36.740 --> 00:30:39.200 is the question. Thanks for diving deep with 00:30:39.200 --> 00:30:40.200 us today. See you next time.