Rappers Who Died Tragically

Developed as danceable house party music in 1970s New York, rap and hip-hop evolved into a vital, visceral, and expressive form of musical storytelling. The beats may be inspired by disco, soul, and funk, but the lyrical content to rap is more akin to balladry or folk — the best rappers are usually the ones who tell deeply personal stories about what it feels like to be a young American in the 20th or 21st century, with an emphasis on struggles, setbacks, and triumphs. Groups like Public Enemy and N.W.A. made hip-hop a place where real social issues were discussed and one that highlighted how just getting by was often a matter of life and death. 

The world of rap has been particularly struck by tragedy, seemingly disproportionately more so than other forms of entertainment. Too many rappers have died too early, at the peak of their fame and influence, before they ever got a chance to get old. Here are some major pioneers and luminaries of hip-hop who died too soon, via especially tragic circumstances.

In the '90s, the East Coast had Biggie Smalls, while the West Coast's biggest star was Tupac Shakur, who performed under the name 2Pac. After cutting his teeth with Digital Underground, 2Pac went solo, releasing the albums "2Pacalypse Now" and "Strictly 4 My N.***A.Z.," which showcased not only his guttural voice and tough point of view (masking an undeniable vulnerability) but his versatility. 2Pac could rap sensitively on "Keep Ya Head Up," lasciviously on "I Get Around," or socially consciously on "Brenda's Got a Baby." Shakur released tons of music but expressed himself with acting, too, appearing in movies like "Juice," "Above the Rim," and "Poetic Justice."

According to Biography, on September 7, 1996, Shakur went to Las Vegas to see boxer Mike Tyson fight Bruce Seldon at the MGM Grand. After a scuffle with a gang member in the casino, he got into a BMW with Death Row Records boss Suge Knight. On the way to a club where 2Pac was to perform, a white Cadillac pulled up alongside the BMW, and a still-unknown assailant fired 13 rounds into the car — four hit Shakur. At a local hospital, the rapper endured several lifesaving surgeries, including the removal of a badly damaged lung, and was placed on a ventilator and respirator. After a brief resuscitation, Shakur succumbed to his injuries and died six days later. He was 25.

Just when rap was earning mainstream appeal and acceptance via talented but widely palatable '80s acts like Run-DMC and D.J. Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince, along came N.W.A. The group virtually invented gangsta rap, a subgenre that detailed the shocking and often violent world of inner-city Los Angeles, in which the group's members were born and raised. N.W.A. brought a new kind of storytelling and point of view to popular music with albums like "Straight Outta Compton" and also launched its members to stardom, particularly Dr. Dre, Ice Cube, and Eazy-E. Otherwise known as Eric Wright, the gang member-turned-musician possessed N.W.A.'s most distinctive voice, spiritually and literally, contributing to rap milestones like "F**k tha Police," "Gangsta Gangsta," and "Boyz-n-the-Hood." After an ugly feud split up N.W.A., Eazy-E embarked on a very successful solo career.

In February 1995, UPI reported that Wright, who'd long suffered from asthma, had checked into the intensive care unit of Los Angeles' Cedars-Sinai Medical Hospital, assuming he was suffering from that medical condition. His problems weren't asthma-related, however — doctors diagnosed the formerly sturdy but noticeably slight rapper with AIDS. Ten days later, complications from the horrific disease took his life. Eazy-E was 30.

There were a lot of pop-savvy R&B trios in the '90s, but TLC stood out from the rest because each of its members had a distinct, memorable, and charismatic personality. The "L" in TLC was Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes, the rapping complement to her singing cohorts T-Boz and Chili, so named because her left eye was slightly larger than the right, over which she fashionably wore condoms to promote safer sex practices. Left Eye performed memorable, acrobatic raps on almost all of TLC's many hits, including on "Ain't 2 Proud 2 Beg," "Waterfalls," and "No Scrubs." Outspoken and assertive when not performing, Lopes once got angry with a boyfriend and burned down his house, and on a "Behind the Music" episode, she explained the shady and exploitative music industry math that led TLC to bankruptcy, despite selling millions of albums.

According to The New York Times, Lopes maintained a home in rural Honduras and was driving an SUV while visiting the Central American country one day in April 2002. She lost control of the vehicle, and it ran off the road and turned over multiple times, according to local police. There were seven other people in the SUV, including Lopes' two siblings, the R&B trio Egypt, and two producers working on a Lopes documentary. All were treated at a hospital and released, but the accident killed the TLC rapper. Lopes was 30.

Born in Jamaica and raised in New York, Dwight Myers took on the stage name Heavy D and, with his group the Boyz, became the first act signed to influential R&B and hip-hop label Uptown Records. With and without the collective, Heavy D scored a slew of top-selling albums and pop radio-friendly rap hits like "Now That We Found Love," "Nuttin' By Love," and "Got Me Waiting" and guested on standout tracks by Janet Jackson ("Alright"), Michael Jackson ("Jam"), and Soul for Real ("Candy Rain"). The rapper did a fair bit of acting, too, making appearances on '90s sitcoms like "A Different World," "Living Single," and "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" and scoring a recurring role as the operator of a restaurant frequented by the main characters of "Bones."

In November 2011, according to The New York Times, the self-described "overweight lover" collapsed at his Los Angeles home, and paramedics rushed him to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. The hitmaker died in the hospital hours later at age 44. A month later, a Los Angeles County Coroner investigation (via The Guardian) revealed the cause of Heavy D's sudden and mysterious death: a pulmonary embolism brought on by deep vein thrombosis. A blood clot had likely formed in his leg during a long-haul flight from London to Los Angeles, and it migrated to a lung, which held back blood flow and put pressure on his heart.

Staten Island's own Wu-Tang Clan is the arguably the greatest collective in rap history, boasting nine full-fledged members who brought their own unique contributions to the enterprise, and is responsible for all-time classics like "Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)" and "Wu-Tang Forever." Even more so than cohorts Method Man and RZA, Russell Jones, or rather Ol' Dirty B*stard, is likely the most famous Wu-Tang rapper, what with his distinctive vocal range, wild style, and flairs for both the dramatic and comical. Also known by the stage names Dirt McGirt, Osirus, and Big Baby Jesus, ODB shined — and got absolutely filthy and weird — on Wu-Tang standards like "Protect Ya Neck," along with his solo singles like "Got Your Money."

A few days before his 36th birthday in November 2004, according to The Guardian, ODB was at a New York recording studio, working on his fourth solo album "Osirus," when he collapsed outside without warning. By the time medical authorities arrived, the rapper had already died. A few weeks later, the NYC medical examiner (via Rolling Stone) released the results of an autopsy. A toxic combination of cocaine and Tramadol, a prescription painkiller, had caused the colorful musician's heart attack.

Mobb Deep came onto the scene strong in the '90s with "The Infamous and Hell on Earth," landmarks of both the very fruitful decade for hardcore rap and for the East Coast, New York-based scene in particular. Mobb Deep was a duo, consisting of Havoc (Kejuan Muchita) and Prodigy (Albert Johnson). Affiliated with the influential 50 Cent and his G-Unit collective, Mobb Deep experienced a resurgence in popularity in the mid-2000s, although it was interrupted when Prodigy had to serve a three-year prison sentence for weapons charges. Forever turning his darker experiences into art, Prodigy later published "commissary kitchen: my infamous prison cookbook," a collection of jailhouse recipes, on his own imprint.

According to The Independent, Prodigy was diagnosed as an infant with sickle cell anemia, a painful, chronic disorder where red blood cells take on a crescent shape, which slows down and obstructs blood flow. That can lead to extensive and frequent medical treatment, and Prodigy sought relief during a Las Vegas tour stop in 2017. While under a doctor's care for his sickle cell anemia, Prodigy choked on an egg and died. The Mobb Deep star was 42.

Pop Smoke brought the Brooklyn drill subgenre of hip-hop to the masses. According to The Ringer, the style melds spooky British production techniques with trap beats and often dark lyrics. In 2019, he released his first major project, "Meet the Woo," with the follow-up "Meet the Woo 2" debuting in February 2020 and hitting No. 7 on the Billboard album chart. His star was on the rise, and he'd go on to work with heavy hitters like Travis Scott and Nicki Minaj and also score numerous top 20 singles in 2010 and 2021, including "For The Night," "What You Know About Love," "The Woo," and "Mood Swings."

Sadly, Pop Smoke, born Bashar Jackson, wouldn't live to see much of his phenomenal success. According to The New York Times, the rapper had relocated from New York to a home in Hollywood he rented from "Real Housewives of Beverly Hills" star Teddi Mellencamp. It was there in the early hours of February 19, 2020, that a group of men allegedly broke in and shot the rapper. A few hours later, he died at a local hospital. Pop Smoke was 20 years old. (Per the BBC, three men and two teenagers were later arrested and faced robbery and murder charges.)

While he'd find national success as part of a popular rap collective, the rapper who called himself Proof was a local legend in the Detroit rap scene of the 1990s. According to AllMusic, he hosted and competed in rap battles and even won the 1999 "Unsigned Hype" award bestowed by hip-hop magazine The Source. It was in this world that he and Eminem became friends and collaborators, and the latter would later ask Proof (also known as DeShaun Holton) to join his rap collective, D12. He participated on two D12 albums in the 2000s, "Devil's Night" and "D12 World," released the solo record "Searching for Jerry Garcia," and played the role of daunting battle rapper Lil' Tic in Eminem's lightly fictionalized biopic "8 Mile." (The major character of Future, portrayed by Mekhi Phifer, was inspired by Proof.)

In the early hours of April 11, 2006, according to Rolling Stone, a fight broke out at 3C, a club in the Eight Mile area of Detroit. Police arrived at the illegal, after-hours institution after receiving reports of shots fired. According to Billboard, police say that Mario Etheridge fatally shot Proof after the rapper shot and killed Etheridge's cousin after a disagreement over a pool game. Proof was pronounced dead on arrival at a local hospital. He was 32 years old.

The Detroit-based rap trio Slum Village got its big break in 1998 when asked to be the opening act on what was advertised as A Tribe Called Quest's final tour. The breakout star of Slum Village — rapper and producer James Yancey, or Jay Dee, but more prominently known as J Dilla, who had decided to give performance more of a try after having collaborated with major acts in the genre, including De La Soul and Busta Rhymes. After releasing a Slum Village record in 2000, J Dilla went solo with "Welcome 2 Detroit" the following year. Around the turn of the millennium, J Dilla moonlighted as one of the hottest producers in hip-hop and R&B, shepherding Common's "Like Water for Chocolate," D'Angelo's "Voodoo," and projects for Macy Gray and Erykah Badu.

Toward the end of his life, J Dilla suffered from lupus, a painful autoimmune disease characterized by widespread inflammation. He required the use of a wheelchair on some of his final concert dates, and in February 2006, per Billboard, the rapper and producer died from complications of the disease at the age of 32.

Born in Chicago but raised in South Memphis, according to AllMusic, Young Dolph became a leader and superstar of the emergent Memphis scene by combining hard-edged, visceral, and highly descriptive lyrics with the irresistible, club-ready beats of Southern rap. His mixtapes made him a big deal locally in the 2000s, but by the mid-2010s, Young Dolph was a national sensation, releasing hit albums like "King of Memphis," "Role Model," and "Dum and Dummer," and smash hit singles "100 Shots" and "Major."

On November 17, 2021, according to Fox 13, Young Dolph, born Adolph Robert Thornton, Jr., walked into Makeda's Butter Cookies in his hometown of Memphis, a business he visited regularly and would often promote. But shortly after he arrived,  a car drove up to the bakery and two men emerged, brandishing firearms and shooting into the store. Young Dolph was killed in the gunfire. The rapper was 36.

Throughout the 1990s, Michigan-based Kid Rock — and his Twisted Brown Trucker Band of associates — combined the vocal delivery of rap with heavy metal instrumentation to create a new form of music called rap-rock. Kid Rock and company broke into the mainstream in the latter part of the decade with hits like "Bawitdaba" and "Cowboy," and as part of his entourage and backing band, Joe C. both experienced it all and helped make it happen, enjoying featured performances on multiple tracks on record and in concert. The man born Joe Calleja added humor to the proceedings whenever he could, rapping boastfully about the size of his genitalia (per ABC News) or donning wild stage costumes, dressing up like Jimi Hendrix and Jerry Lee Lewis' cousin-bride.

Joe C. was diagnosed with a serious case of Celiac disease as a child, which limited his growth to a height of 3'9" and which required him to take as many as 65 pills daily and undergo kidney dialysis treatments. Days after turning 26, Joe C.'s body was discovered by his mother in her Michigan home.

According to Vulture, Jahseh Onfroy, better known as XXXTentacion, broke out on the digital hip-hop underground of SoundCloud, releasing a slew of songs and albums on the service in 2014 when he was barely 16 years old. Within three years, he was scoring mainstream hits on the Billboard pop chart, like "Look at Me" and "Jocelyn Flores," with non-SoundCloud albums "17" and "?" hitting No. 2 and No. 1, respectively. His music was urgent and rife with tales of extreme violence and battles with mental illness, according to Rolling Stone.

Off the mic, XXXTentacion's life was arguably even more troubled and violent. In 2016, he assaulted his romantic partner, threatening to cut off her tongue, allegedly because she was singing somebody else's songs. A few months later, he held a knife to that same partner's throat when he suspected infidelity. After she revealed that she was pregnant, XXX beat her, promised to kill her, and locked her in an apartment, which she escaped after two days. The case was never resolved, as XXXTentacion was gunned down in Florida in June 2018. The rapper was 20.

A Tribe Called Quest were one of the most acclaimed and influential hip hop groups of all time. They helped introduce jazz sampling into rap and eschewed the boastfulness of their peers to look inward and discuss social issues. The trio consisted of DJ Ali Shaheed Muhammad, Q-Tip, and Phife Dawg (Malik Taylor) on now-classics like "Can I Kick It," "I Left My Wallet in El Segundo," "Scenario," and "Award Tour," before breaking up in 1998, according to NPR.

At age 19, in 1990 and just weeks after A Tribe Called Quest released its first album, according to KQED, Phife Dawg was diagnosed with diabetes. He suffered complications from the metabolic disease and spent two years on dialysis treatments awaiting a kidney transplant, which he received in 2008, according to AllHipHop. Phife continued to suffer issues, however, and he needed another kidney in 2013, per the BBC, sending him back into regular dialysis sessions. A Tribe Called Quest reunited in 2015 on "The Tonight Show," and, according to the New York Times, he patched things up with Q-Tip and proposed they quietly record another album. Phife Dawg died at age 45 in March 2016, before "We Got It From Here, Thank You for Your Service" was completed or released.