Original subtitles

This programme contains strong and discriminatory language.

I got a new toy to show you, Louis. Wow, interesting. What's that doing there?

Protecting and serving, my guy. Why would you need that?

What do you mean, why I would I need that?

I'm in Florida. Let me see that.

I'm in Florida. I need it.

You know, there's very strict protocols for the BBC

to do with guns and gun safety.

Would you be able to do a little performance?

Yeah, of course.

DRUMBEAT MACHINE

I was exploring one of America's most creative

and controversial music scenes.

Why do you have that?

My friends are famous. They're rappers.

They gotta be protected at all times.

In Florida, rap is a multimillion dollar industry,

giving unvarnished expression to a host of social ills.

In that video, he was not sober, though, correct?

Yeah, no, none of us were. It was fun then,

and then it got to the point where we weren't doing it for fun,

we were just doing it to not feel bad, you know?

But some of its biggest artists stand accused of participating in

the lawlessness their music describes...

Shots going to start going off.

Boop, boop, boop!

...in lives that play out in front of fans on social media...

These are violent criminals involved in gang activity.

...in a world where the stakes are stardom, incarceration, and death.

Just your being here could lead to something?

MAN LAUGHS

I love this shit.

Welcome home, kid.

HE LAUGHS

Outside a jail on the outskirts of Orlando,

I was part of the welcoming committee for Darrin Robinson.

An aspiring rapper under the name Peso Lucianno,

he'd just been released after a four-year term for burglary.

How you feeling?

I'm free, Bitch!

LAUGHTER Yes!

With me was a rising rap mogul, Andrew Lambert,

better known by his industry moniker Drew Filmed It.

Drew, do you want to quickly fill us in what's going on?

OK, OK, yeah.

Wow. Yeah.

And now he's out. And what's the plan?

You're going to help him blow up?

Yeah. He's gonna do his thing. So Peso raps?

Yeah, he make music.

How's it going? How you feeling?

Shit, you tell me how I'm feeling.

How you feeling?

I feel good. All right, well, shit, likewise. Ditto, my boy.

I think this is a bigger day for you than it is for me, though.

No shit. You here - that's a big day for you too.

Is it? Yeah, you meet a superstar.

Drew, you've got some of the biggest artists in Florida

right now on your books, right?

Yeah. How does Peso fit into all of that?

I'm next. That's what it is. Yeah.

That's what you want him to say. I'll tell you.

I'm next. I'm on my way!

LAUGHTER

Drew's company, 100k,

is one of the biggest rap management firms in Florida.

Here he is. How you doing? Louis.

Most of its music is in the genre known as trap,

from the southern slang "“trap house", meaning drug house.

These are all the artists that are with 100k right now.

Um, we got about 20.

So talk me through a few of these.

We've got Melly at the top there.

And then Von,

then we got Hotboii, BSlime...

Damn near everyone that you could think of right now.

So Deep Grimeyy, Slatt...

Slatt zy. Zy...

Cee Murdaa.

Cee Murdaa.

Who's your biggest artist? Melly?

Melly, Von... Von.

And Hotboii's catching up to them right now.

And Melly's behind bars... Yep.

...and Von's dead. Yep.

So Hotboii's...

Yeah, Hotboii doing his thing.

Tell me about your teeth.

Is it diamonds?

Yeah, they're diamonds.

Yeah, yeah. Flawless.

Flawless, gang.

So let a dawg join a club, you know what I'm saying?

Woo!

Must've been weird to get used to having them in?

Yup. Eating with them?

Um, I had a lisp for about a week

and it hurt a little bit to eat.

How much did it cost?

25 to 30.

25,000 to 30,0007

Yeah. So that's just...

It's just a costly process. HE LAUGHS

Should we look at a couple of videos?

Yeah. There's one called Don't Need Time?

Yeah, Don't Need Time. Can we look at that? Yup.

It was actually shot at a funeral, is that right?

Yeah. And it was a funeral of Hotboii's friend Wolph.

Is that right? Wolph, yup, yup. That had passed away.

That had been shot and died. Yeah.

MUSIC: Don't Need Time by Hotboii

Hotboii's friend, Wolph Luma, had been shot and killed

last year at a house party.

# I know my nigga made it to heaven, I know it

# Wish I could call his phone and tell him how it's going... #

The video for Don't Need Time is both a lament about his loss

and also a display of high-calibre gun ownership.

Are the guns, just to ask a naive question, are they real?

I don't know. They weren't mine.

As far as you know, you had no reason to believe otherwise?

Yeah, I don't know.

To someone who sees that and says, "Well, you know, it's kind of

"slightly glamourising the thug life"?

He's acting. Yeah.

That's the way I look at it.

We're just making a movie.

There's movies all day, doing the same thing,

so that's how I think about it.

What time's Hotboii going to be here, do we think?

Let me call him. Is he usually pretty punctual?

Ah... Ah, sometimes. It depends.

I call it rapper time. Rapper time.

Yo. Where you at?

On the way.

Are you gonna come to the office or are we going to the studio?

Studio... I think he said studio.

All right, yeah, we'll be there.

All right. All right, gang.

So he's on his way there now?

Yeah, so we should probably go over there, but he's cool.

He's in the studio. If not...

If we're late, he'll record, you know? Yeah.

You've been involved in this for how many years, would you say?

Music total, probably 2016,

so four and a half, I would say.

How old are you now?

I'm 20. 207

Yeah, 20.

You're making a good living from what I can tell.

Mm-hm. A millionaire?

Oh, no, not yet.

Almost. I'm good.

You're getting there. I'm getting there.

But I told myself this year I'm going to be one. Really?

Yeah, that's what I told myself. That's my goal in life.

You've seen artists come along and then blow up, right?

So you know what the tactics are in terms of... Yeah.

...reaching people, promotion,

connecting with your audience, right?

How important is social media?

It's really, really important. Very important, yeah.

Just like TikTok.

One year of being at TikTok,

it got, like, 70 artist record deals.

I always tell artists, "Post what you would want to see on there too.

"Just don't post a post - post what you think is going to catch

"somebody's eye scrolling down the timeline," cos a lot of the time

I just scroll, scroll, scroll.

I go, "Scroll up, right, OK, that just caught my attention."

So just think of things like that to really, like, catch my eye

or catch another person's eye to stop scrolling and really

focus on what they want to watch or view.

The man we were en route to see, Hotboii,

born Javarri Walker, is a rising star of the Florida scene with over

a million followers on Instagram.

# Sometimes I feel like the only thing can heal me is the bag... #

But along with fame had come an alleged conflict

with another of Orlando's biggest rappers, 9lokkNine.

MUSIC: Crayola by 9lokkNine

# Do what you gon' do No Crayola, it get violent

# My shooters real steppers, tip-toeing, move in silence... #

Authorities saw the feud as part of a wider dispute in Orlando

between two rival gangs that had left four people dead

and many more injured, though the rappers themselves have denied this.

Much of the feuding had played out on social media.

Encouraged by fans, 9lokkNine had insulted his rival on Instagram...

...while Hotboii had responded with rambling, off-the-cuff monologues.

I went to jail, right?

So niggas get their little chance to shine, right?

So now when I get out, I take back over.

I take back over when I get out.

Now they hate me for that?

What? HE LAUGHS

What?!

I was hoping that meeting Hotboii might be a chance to understand

why violent feuds were so much a part of the lives

of Florida rappers.

MUSIC: Fuck Shit by Hotboii

# Yeah, we be on that fuck shit too

# Yeah, we be on that fuck shit too. #

Nice.

"We be on that fuck shit too."

What does it mean?

We're gonna fuck shit, like, wilding out crazy.

Just going crazy, having parties? Having fun?

Yeah, like fuck shit, period, like, just anything, like...

Yeah, having parties, turning up,

doing crazy stuff.

You feel me? Stuff like that.

Yeah.

So is that legal here?

Weed's not really illegal.

If you get caught with weed, you just get, like, a ticket.

You can't go to jail for it no more.

It'll get me right.

I'm ready to start my day.

LAUGHTER

I know... Like, I've read up on you, and I've listened to your music,

which I love. I've seen a few interviews online.

I appreciate that, man. Yeah.

I know that you came up, in some ways, the hard way.

Like, your life was a struggle in some respects. Yeah.

Is that fair to say that?

Yeah. You had run-ins with the law. I read you used to grab iPhones?

Yeah. How you knew that?

I saw it online.

You know, just needed money.

Don't want to ask Mom for it,

cos Mom needs that money to pay the bills.

You felt that you didn't want to impose, like she needed money

for other things?

Yeah. For, like, my other siblings who were not old enough to

go get money yet. How old were you?

Like, 15. You got some time off it, and then...

And then were you doing music before you went inside?

Yeah, but I had only released, like...

I'd say, like, four or five songs.

And then when you came out you were hotter than ever, right?

Cos you got 45 million streams of Don't Need Time, right?

Oh, yeah. That's my highest one.

I need more like that.

You know, in knowing this world a little bit it's evident

that a lot of the young rappers get caught up in different

kinds of cases, even after they become somewhat successful.

What do you think it is that is causing that to happen?

People look at us,

and they feel like if we got money, we got power,

so they just... I don't know. They don't like stuff like that.

Jealous people, haters,

people you came up with.

Yeah, that really be the main thing.

You got it and they don't.

You up higher than they are, something...

It just be, like, petty stuff.

So, just to get this out of the way, so...

I saw a comment that you made on your Insta feed.

It was reported that there was some kind of beef between

you and 9lokkNine.

Is there anything you want to put out about that?

Nah.

I don't even know what beef you're talking about. What?

Would we go so far as to say that you have love for 9lokkNine?

HE LAUGHS

LAUGHTER

Next question, gang.

He's in prison. He can't touch you.

I love everybody. I want to see everybody win.

That's how it is. That's how I am.

I want you to win.

I love you. I don't even know you.

Thank you.

I love everybody!

And you love 9lokkNine?

Hey, you, I love you over there.

Hey, Drew...

Hey, Drew?

I love you.

Wait, what? I missed this.

I was asking about alleged feuding with 9lokkNine,

which has obviously been a big thing online.

Hey, what's the next question, though?

What I'm getting from you - correct me if I'm wrong -

so are you trying in some way, like, put that behind you?

Like, any cases you've caught, any mischief you've got into...

Of course. ..you're trying to put that away? Why wouldn't I?

Well, cos the songs sound like you're still...

A lot of the songs are about still doing it.

Nah. It don't be like that.

And of course I want to put everything behind me.

I want to make more money.

You're asking me crazy shit.

You're asking me stupid shit.

Thanks, Hotboii.

It was a slightly awkward end to an otherwise friendly interview,

I left with the sense that, whatever had happened between him

and 9lokkNine, Hotboii would prefer to put it behind him.

The seriousness of the alleged feuding between the rival groups

wasn't always easy to gauge,

playing out in a mixture of inflammatory music videos

and all-too-real grainy phone and CCTV footage on local news.

SIRENS WAIL

# Hey, look man

# I ain't got no row... #

Another of those caught up in the violence was

a third successful Orlando rapper,

an associate of Hotboii's called LPB Poody.

He too had fallen out with 9lokkNine

and had released a beef track, Address It,

widely assumed to be directed at Glokk.

Not long after, he'd been shot.

Poody now lives in Los Angeles, but I'd had a tip-off that he was

back visiting his old neighbourhood.

I was hoping he might shed some light on the violence plaguing

the Orlando scene.

Hi, Poody.

How you doing? Nice to meet you.

Nice to meet you too.

Hey, thanks for speaking to us. Yeah, for sure.

Do you want to introduce me to some of your guys?

Yeah, yeah. I definitely can.

Nice to meet you. Louis.

What's your name?

Gangster. Gangster?

OK.

And then?

Steplight. Steplight? Yes. Louis.

Rambo. Rambo?

Let me show you something.

My shit going crazy on... Look, Spotify.

Look what it's at right now.

34 million. That's been about a year.

34 million.

34 million. Address It.

Address It is really a beef track, right?

Yeah, like, I was addressing a situation.

I had got some beef thrown at me by this other artist,

you know what I'm saying?

So I had to... A local artist? ..do some shots back. Yeah.

You know what I'm saying?

From Orlando. Y'all probably know him, but...

You don't want to put his name out there?

No, I don't want to talk about him. You know what I'm saying?

He kept doing it. Why would they do that?

I don't know but I feel like it's hate,

you know what I'm saying?

Then the streets looking like he punking them.

The track is along the lines of, "If you want to take it there,

"we can take it there." Type shit, yeah, exactly.

You know what I'm saying? Right. Like, bro, I ain't offended...

You know what I'm saying? It just like kept on going on, like you know

how you keep on teasing something, teasing something, teasing something

till you get tired of it? You know what I'm saying? It's like I lost

my shit. Like, "If that's what you want to do then we can do that."

At a certain point, you got shot.

Yeah, I got shot last year.

You and another guy, and the other guy, wasn't he shot and killed?

Yeah. You know what I'm saying? It was...

He was a kid that I grew up with.

And he was an athlete... Yeah.

...and was looking to get out of the situation he was in.

Yeah, he was gone. He was there, like, in two more weeks.

I was just talking to him right before the shooting happened.

He was telling me, he like, "Bro, we're the only two," like,

you know what I'm saying, "that's going to take the hood out of here."

You know what I'm saying?

Then, later on, like a couple hours later, he ends up getting killed.

Shit just happens.

That's pretty sad.

Yeah, it's tough.

This was around the time when my music and everything

was blowing up. Address It took off on TikTok.

The track could have exacerbated a situation that was

already tense, right?

I mean, I don't know.

However you want to put it, I guess.

You think it was related?

I can't say it was or not, but I mean...

Mm...

Definitely.

Did they catch the person who shot you?

Uh, I don't... No. It's been a year now.

You kept that in the streets?

Yeah. HE LAUGHS

He cool with it, you know?

For real, though, yeah.

Did you?

Yeah, I mean, hey.

The object of the game is to stay alive.

That's where I'm at. You know what I'm saying?

In response to the violence,

Poody had taken the unusual step of going on Instagram

to disavow the feuding.

I'm not part of no gang, I ain't beefing with nobody.

All these bodies end up dead, missing and all that,

I ain't got nothing to do with that, at all.

Nah, Poody scared, he ain't vibing.

I'm scared. I ain't vibing. I'm scared, y'all.

I'm a rapper, bro. I'm a full-time rapper.

Poody's move to LA had been in part an attempt to get away from

the street politics of his home city.

Sad to say, correct me if I'm wrong,

the situation now is where just your being here could be construed

as what? Like, that could lead potentially to something?

Or... I don't know, man. ..you're just conscious of not...

It, like... What is it?

I don't know. You know what I'm saying?

I might do be a target, but I don't know, cos I'm somebody now,

you know what I'm saying? I'm rapping. I don't know who feel

like they got any kind of animosity towards me. I don't know.

It could be from anywhere. You ain't never know - it could be

somebody close to you. They just don't like...

Well, you think one of these guys might do you in?

Nah, nah. HE LAUGHS

You think there could be trouble right here right now?

It could pop off at any minute, any second.

Anything, man. You don't know. One of these...

"It could pop off at any second"!

Yeah, real spills!

Nah, though. These my boys.

No, these are your guys, right? They've got your back.

Oh, yeah. Hopefully it doesn't come to that.

My back, my front, my side. Left, right, up, down.

They got everything!

I'm good.

With the feuding and it's cost in human life all too real,

Poody struck me as someone caught up in a situation

he neither wanted nor was able to fully put behind him,

in a world where disagreements expressed in music

and on social media could have lethal consequences.

Away from the crime-plagued world of trap, there exists

a related but distinct subgenre of rap known as SoundCloud.

# Oh, God, up my nose... #

Chronicled in cartoonish videos,

with a more racially diverse cast of rappers,

it too has been turbo-charged by social media...

# Yo, bitch, I'm off my shit... #

...with artists showing off their facial tattoos

and large quantities of prescription drugs.

SMASHING

In a Cuban area of the Miami suburbs,

I had an appointment with Fernando Estrada Jr,

better known as Brokebaby.

You record in here a little bit?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Because your mic's there, yeah, OK, so you do it from behind there.

Yeah. Would you be able to do a little performance?

Yeah, of course.

That was good. It had...

I liked that, that counterpoint of the trebly, slightly tinny,

melodic sample, and then the thumping bass.

Do you think if you just talk into it, like, you just start freestyling

and it just happens?

Shall I try?

# Uh, I'm here with Brokebaby... # Go ahead.

# We are rapping and it is so crazy

# We are sitting around, we are talking

# We are rocking and rocking and rocking... #

We're rocking.

# We are having fun all night

# We are going outta sight... # OK.

# 1... OK, I'm gonna take a perc

# I am gonna chuck it down my neck

# And you will have a sound of me

# I will be chilling out and it be dope and it is sound. #

Oh!

That's right there. He's from Florida.

LAUGHTER

Florida!

Talk me through your tattoos.

The common question everybody asks me is like,

"Bro, were you high, were you drunk when you got them?"

And it was like... What do they say?

This is the Aquarius sign.

Cos I'm an Aquarius.

This one, I just went to a tattoo shop one day and, like,

a little, like... A little sauced.

And I just told my artist,

"Oh, mess me up, man. Like, do whatever."

Oh, my toes curling, boy.

He actually gave me, like, an open wound.

That's what the tattoo is. So he took it literal.

Like, "Dude, I messed you up, like, I gave you an open wound."

I'm like, "Oh, man."

Did it feel like a big step when you got your facial tattoos?

To be honest, nah. I was like, "I want to do music but

"I want to dedicate myself, like, 1 don't want to half-ass it."

You want to commit to it.

Yeah, like, my face was marked up. "I have to do this."

So whenever I look in the mirror, whenever I open my phone,

I see my little black reflection, I see my face, I'm like,

"All right, time to get on that microphone."

One of your tracks is called Punk Baby.

Yeah. And it's got lots of references to you taking

large quantities of drugs.

Yeah. Brother, you gotta do something that, like...

Nobody wants to listen to gospel.

Like, if you wanna listen to gospel,

listen to, like, a reverend or something.

I'm gonna just talk about ignorant stuff cos like it sounds good

in the car.

So you're saying that's just cos it sounds good and it feels good

to play it and listen to it? Yeah, it's a party track. Yeah.

You gotta portray the image you're trying to sell.

Let's look at the video.

Do you have your phone?

Of course.

MUSIC: Punk Baby by Brokebaby

# Yo, bitch, I'm off my shit

# Popping Percocet

# Xanny, be my friend

# Fuck a bitch

# Yo, I don't wanna ring

# I am the king

# Feelin' like LeBron James... #

Brokebaby's biggest hit had been his debut release,

Punk Baby, dropped three years ago,

featuring his best friend, Mikey $wah.

Mikey had died in 2020 from a drug overdose.

The video was an over-the-top celebration of

prescription drug taking.

"Bitch, I'm off my shit...

"Poppin' Percocet.

"Popping Percocet.” Percocet is a... "Xanny, be my friend."

It's a prescription opiate. Yeah.

"Xanny, be my...friend"? My friend, yeah.

Xanax is my friend. Xanax is a... A benzo.

It's a benzodiazepine. Yeah. Freestylin'.

Nobody has ever said, "Xanny is my friend."

How important is it to keep it real, though?

You have to play your role.

To promote a song, right, I could've just easily recorded me

just singing along, right?

Oh, just pretend to do a bump of cocaine in the beginning.

So now people actually will listen to my snippet.

But you weren't actually doing any cocaine?

Yes, but they didn't show it.

Wait, on that one we just saw...

Yeah. ..you were doing cocaine?

But did you see it? HE LAUGHS

Oh, I just liked it.

Sorry.

I was trying to rewind.

Would it be more embarrassing to be taking it or not taking it?

What do the two scenarios imply?

So it's like you rap about drugs but then you say you don't do them,

you kind of look like a poser.

To be real you had to live up to the lyrics and the image

that you were portraying?

Yeah, yeah, that was my mind-set at first.

But then it's really self-destructive.

I'm getting mixed messages on where you're at

with respect to drugs in reality.

I've been sober for over eight months, so...

Have you?

Yeah. If anything, I just smoke my weed.

But you don't do hard drugs, is that right?

No, no. There's no point.

You're just... You're having fun for the moment.

And you're not making the most out of the moment.

I mean, it took my best friend's life.

I was popping pills but, like, he was into, like, the heavy shit.

Speaking to Broke, I'd been struck that in his world,

as with the world of trap, a career that relied on provocations

chronicled on social media also carried risks.

# If you're a hitter you know there's no limit, yo

# If you're a hitter you know there's no limit

# Scrappy's strapped up and he's standing on business... #

Since meeting Hotboii and Poody, I'd been thinking about the deaths

plaguing the trap scene.

# Consistent on making this ticket

# Wrap it up, acrobat, flip it... #

On the northside of Miami,

I'd made contact with another local figure...

# Rockstar, slash that blockstar shit... #

Ratchet Roach straddles the worlds of SoundCloud and trap,

but he is mainly known for his role as a security guy

to other rappers.

I was hoping he might help me understand the violence in

the lives of so many artists.

Let me hear that shit.

When did you write that one, Ratchet?

In the car on the way here.

Really? What are you saying?

What is it? I said... Yeah. What is the lyric?

I said, I said... I say... What did I say?

"There ain't no gimmicks with this." I said...

# It ain't no gimmicks with this

# Give me a ticket with sticks If you... #

# If you were here, then you'd know there's no limit,

# Scrappy strapped up and he's standing on business... #

"Scrappy scrap?"

Scrappy - that's like my home boy, my scrap -

I said, "Scrappy strapped up and he's standing on business."

What's "Scrappy scrapped up" mean? Like our scraps.

Like my scraps, like my home boy.

Scrappy strapped up like he got the scrap on him.

Scrappy STRAPPED up?

So basically you're saying, "I have a friend here,

"he's got a gun and we are robbing and we are..."

LAUGHTER

Is that basically it?

Got it. Like, "It ain't no gimmicks with this" be like,

"It ain't no jokes with this. Like, this ain't no movie."

Do you ever worry that you're glamourising it?

No, cos it's like... It's already been altered in my life already.

Let me tell you why he can't say it like that, cos then he'll be

some of these other rappers that really just talk about...

Like, they just telling a story. He ain't just telling a story.

Yeah, I be really telling the truth. It's really his life. My life.

You can make stuff up, but... But Scrappy's not strapped up here.

LAUGHS: We ain't going to show you...

You want me to...? You think you...?

THEY LAUGH He's standing on business!

For an education in the source of the music,

Ratchet had offered to take me to one of his old neighbourhoods.

Y'all in the trenches now!

Deerfield Beach lies north of Miami,

an area with off-the-charts unemployment

and a homicide rate well above the national average.

Do you rap as well?

I'm Billy Glocks. I mean, I rap sometimes, but not really.

MAN LAUGHS I'm really the background man.

How do you fit in, Billy Glocks?

Security. Are you? Do you have any Glocks?

Not with me. I got something else, though.

What's that? It's for real. This is an AR.

Really... This is a submachine gun.

Why do you have that? For protection!

Against who? Against anybody.

My friends are famous. They're rappers.

They got to be protected at all times.

This is where you grew up, Ratchet?

I grew up in Coral Springs, and then I stayed in Pompano,

which is on the other side.

This a big part of Ratchet Roach.

I ain't never forgetting where I come from.

What's up? What y'all want to walk around there?

You good, Louis? Yes. Stay by me, man. We got to...

We got to protect Louis... Louis walking through the trenches, look.

Why do you call it the trenches? It's treacherous.

You're suggesting that this is a dangerous area?

Anybody can't walk through the hood with a camera

and all that jewellery on and all that, cos they'll get you.

Why would... Why would they do that? You got to have a name and a face.

I'm in the Deerfield. What happening? That Ratchet?

Text me, text me.

Louis. Nice to meet you. Yeah. Louis, man!

Nice to meet you, Louis. You too. Multimillionaire in the hood!

Stop playing!

Present company excluded, who do the kids look up to

and the people feel, in terms of rap? Over here?

Yeah, in terms of, like, next level.

Man, I'm... Truth. More factual pain music. Street poets.

Yeah, but who? Like Hotboii? NFL Von. Himself.

We know NFL Von, we know where we're from,

we know what's going on around here, so...

You ask anyone of these young boys out here,

they're going to know a Von song. Wait, is Von here?

Von on the porch. He can't... He on house arrest.

He can't leave the porch. He can't leave the porch?

But you just see how he just gave...?

Did you see how he gave the green light to come over here, though?

Who gave us the green light to come over here?

Von was at the porch. You see me talking.

He talk, then he said, "Go to the block."

That means he gave us a green light to come out here

and just be able to breathe, cos...

So are we here under Von's protection?

Yeah, you're under Von's protection right now, cos I protect myself.

I'm not worried about me. Now I'm more worried about you.

I tell you what, I'l put you under Von's protection.

You got to understand... Look, these my niggas, right?

Louis, I'm in the field. Your ass not in the field.

I'm going to look after you, man. THEY LAUGH

You look worried. 'Ll take care of you.

Is this Von? That's NFL Von.

At a house up the block, I had a chance to meet

the neighbourhood's newest rap hope, NFL Von.

That's a lot of money. I won't run away with it? May I?

You can't, cos that's going to be a bad thing, Louis.

And we're protecting you, Louis. Remember that.

It's all 20s, 50s, 100s!

That's a lot of money! You've got to understand, Louis.

Do you really want to be walking around with that?

Yeah.

Why don't you put it in a bank? Let it earn some interest.

But what if somebody scam me?

Someone would scam you?

Well, you've got to look at what the rates of interest are.

Why is it important to you to show the money?

Nah, it's just showing your wealth.

Why, though? People want to know that.

People want to interact with you. If people know you broke,

they not going to pay attention to you.

If they know you got money, they going to watch,

they going to, like...

It's important to...create an impression of material success.

Are you doing shows?

Nah. I got two more months on community patrol, like house arrest.

I can't leave right here.

How long were you inside for?

Me? Inside the house?

No, no, in jail?

Oh, I did two and a half years, then I got out,

and I went back in for like 30 days.

Got to. Everybody trying to get out the 'jets.

Get out the...? The 'jets. What's the jets? The hood.

No, it's like project. Like, short for projects.

Projects. All right.

Is there a track you want to play?

Yeah. OK, let's do it.

Them boys stars! Them boys stars! LAUGHTER

The visit to Deerfield Beach was a reminder of the appeal

of those artists most closely connected with the streets

and the urge of residents to hear music

that reflected their real-life struggles.

For many of those in areas of low opportunity,

a rap career represents one of the few clear avenues to success.

ON RADIO: Good Friday morning. I'm Sam Chapman.

First, your morning headlines...

It was now three months since I'd first arrived in Florida.

Homicides in the state had been surging.

According to the Department of Law Enforcement's annual crime report,

murders rose nearly 15%

and aggravated assaults increased by nearly 10%...

News had come that the most controversial of Orlando's rappers,

9lokkNine, who'd allegedly feuded with Hotboii and Poody,

had been released from jail on bond while he awaited trial

for attempted murder.

I don't take this internet shit serious. I laugh at this shit.

I'd contacted his lawyers, hoping to speak to him.

While I was waiting to hear back,

I received a video message from Brokebaby.

Hey, man, Louis, you need to come back here, man, honestly.

Got to talk again, for real.

He revealed on the phone that the last time we'd spoken,

he'd been high on Xanax, but now he was clean.

Hey! What's up, my man? How you doing?

It's good to see you. Chillin', chillin'. Can we come in? Of course.

He'd offered to introduce me to his parents.

Hi. How are you? Hola. Hello.

Cuban coffee?

Cuban coffee would be nice. Si. Por favor.

Have you listened? Has escuchado la musica de Brokebaby?

I like that. You like it? Yeah.

Oh, my God! Tell Me First is... I'm loving it.

And you're OK with the tattoos? The tattoos?

Que es la palabra en espanol?

Tattoos. Tattoos? Tattoos.

No es un problema por la madre de Brokebaby?

No, no, no. Para nada. Para nada.

Adelante. Go ahead.

And did you... Have you been open about substance issues

that you've had in the past? Oh, yeah, they know about that.

And they've helped me with it too, you know. Really?

Yeah, going to, like, detoxes and all that.

It's a complicated side to the music. Yeah.

So they understand but they've helped me a lot with it.

Have they? Yeah, yeah.

We should look at some photos of you from back in the day.

This is Baby.

That's Brokebaby as a baby.

Baby!

Very cute. SHE LAUGHS

This is him with long hair.

GASPS: With long hair? That's you? Yes, sir.

And who are you with? My girlfriend.

I've been with her six, seven years.

What's her name? Megan. She's already on her way over here.

Is she? Yeah, yeah.

I'm not sure.

Should we have a look?

Bro, you be speeding it! Thank you. This looks fire.

All right, I'll let you know.

With his mic still on, Brokebaby had what sounded like

a drug deal with his friend.

Finally!

Everything OK? Yeah, I've been needing this for a minute.

Was that Megan? Nah, that's her friend. That's her friend.

Yeah, I'm cool with all her friends.

I've been needing this one for a minute. Is she coming?

Oh, so she's not coming in? Nah. Her? Nah. She...

It was just to drop this off for me. OK. Yeah.

Broke had wanted to take me to the site of a videoshoot

for a track called You A Bitch

by the friend of his who'd died, Mikey $wah.

But with the recently conducted deal in mind, it was all slightly odd.

Should we look at the Mikey $wah video?

Yes, sir. His video's pretty dope too.

# Fell off cos a bitch Nigga, you a bitch

# One of your niggas got hit Rest in piss

# Can't fuck with no snake? I hear them hissing

# Diamond all shining, cos they fake They ain't glistenin'... #

Why did he have "Fuck you" tattooed on his eye lids?

Was he angry about something?

No. That was just him. He took everything as a joke.

It wasn't serious. He was like, "Yeah, when police stop me,

"I'm just going to close my eyes."

How did he die?

It was, like, fentanyl. Somebody sold him some boof shit.

He was sober for, like, almost a year, literally.

In that video, he was not sober, though, correct?

Yeah, nah, none of us were. It was fun then.

And then it got to the point where we're not...

We weren't doing it for fun,

we were just doing it to not feel bad, you know?

Shit was hard.

Like, cos of that, it got me to get sober, you know?

Like, I actually got sober and not just a month, two months

and then relapsed. No. So I don't be touching nothing now.

Cos I feel like it's kind of disrespectful

doing whatever killed your best friend, you know?

Back at his studio, I had a moment to level with Broke.

So I wanted to bring something up, and I... I don't...

I hope this isn't awkward, but when the car pulled up

and the girl was in it, we could hear you, on the mic. Yeah.

And so she was dropping off drugs, right?

Nah, she was telling me that she was selling drugs.

She's like "Oh, I got this,"

and I'm like, "Oh, for sure I'll let you know."

I just got the charger, though. But she said,

"Let me know if you like it. And I can get you more."

Yeah, like, maybe you fuck with, like, the drugs

that she was selling. Like, "If you like this drug, let me know..."

"I can bring more over..."

Right, so she was giving you some... And I'm not trying to, like...

Nah, nah, nah, nah. She was showing me, like, "I got this."

It was pills, and I'm like, "For sure."

Like, "If you like that, I got more.”

And I'm like, "Nah, I'm not trying to get that."

I wasn't buying any drugs.

What would be the problem with you saying she was dropping off drugs?

I mean, nothing would be the problem. It's just...

You know, I'm pretty straight up, but I'm like, "Nah."

There wouldn't be a problem.

You've been through, you know, difficult stuff in the past, right?

Yeah. You've dealt with the death of a close friend.

And you've had success, and then you've had, you know,

a falling off a little bit, so it would be reasonable

for you to feel like a little bit, you know... Yeah, down.

Like, losing my friends.

I just got the charger. But, yeah.

Y'all good? Y'all want any water? No, I'm good. Thank you, though.

I left Broke with a plan to meet at a future video shoot,

though I had my doubts whether it would ever happen.

Mainly, I was struck by his vulnerability.

Understood properly, his music seemed an expression of pain

in a world where the threats came in many forms.

Since arriving in Florida,

I'd wondered about the persistence of chaos

in the lives of artists who were successful.

Now hoping for an answer,

I travelled 650 miles from Miami to Greensboro, Georgia,

to speak to a rapper named Foogiano.

In 2020, with more than 900,000 followers on Instagram

and streams in the millions of his track Molly,

he'd been signed to one of world's biggest labels, Atlantic Records.

# Say he gon' shoot Well, bih, what it do?

# I think he bluff in', nigga Where the proof?

# Told you we comin' and we want the loot.

# Try me, boy, I'ma leave you with no roof

# I got that drank, bitch I got that juice... #

Soon after, he'd been sent to jail, when police found him in a car

with a gun while on probation for an old burglary conviction.

Foogiano now resided in county jail.

I was hoping for some insight into his reversal of fortune.

Just follow me... OK. ..and we'll go back.

What was your name again, sir? Major Griffin.

Major Griffin? Louis Theroux.

Hey, nice to meet you, Louis. Nice to meet you, Major Griffin.

So we're going to meet Foogiano? Yes.

For you, he's not Foogiano. Kwame. Kwame. He's just another detainee?

Yeah.

Gentlemen, this is Louis. How you doing? Louis. Louis.

Nice to meet you.

Tell me about where we are. What's going on?

This is your temporary place of residence.

Yeah, this is my cell. You got your grills in here,

I wasn't sure if they'd let you have them. They're permanent.

Oh, they're permanent? Yeah, I can't take them out.

Really? But that could make you a target, couldn't it? Yeah.

If someone wanted... I mean, how much are they worth?

About 100,000. 100,0007? So you got money in your mouth?

Yeah. A lot of it.

Are we close to where you grew up?

This is where I grew up. Like, these are all my people.

Really? These guards... I've been coming to this jail

since I was a little boy. Are you serious?

This the jail. This is where I'm from.

Last year was a huge year for you.

You dropped your debut album, right? Yeah.

Literally the following month... Go to jail.

For having a gun as a felon. Mm-hm.

You were driving? No... No, I was in the backseat. You were in the back.

So when it all happened, where was the gun?

In the front seat, under the front seat.

Right. Why did the police pull you over?

Put it this way, I moved to a richer community,

in the other city that I stayed in. Last year, you did?

Yeah, and they knew who we were.

So the police - the first chance they get, they're going to get me.

You know what I'm saying?

Cos they know we going to have a gun in the car cos I'm a rapper.

I ain't going nowhere without somebody protecting me,

with all the jewellery, my diamonds and all my money on me.

You know, people, they're killing rappers. You know? So...

Who's killing rappers?

The streets. The streets?

I ain't going like that. Jealous people? Jealous people.

Haters? Haters. You said it right -

people that don't got as much as we have.

So, basically, you caught the case for the gun. Mm-hm.

Then at some point, you cut your ankle monitor off.

And at that point, you more or less went on the run?

Mm-hm. Shit was building up.

Everything was going good, and then - boom - that happened.

That's a setback, cos I couldn't do shows.

You could still do some shows. I did some.

Under your own name? Yeah.

But then... But you're on the run at this point. I didn't care.

# 448, I get 'em gone

# Boy, this a hundred million dolla' phone... #

It's not keeping a low profile, is it?

We're smart. I play chess, not checkers.

Couldn't they come and get you on stage?

The crowd ain't going to let them. I used to ask the crowd every time,

"If the police come here to get me, y'all going to let them get me?"” "NO!"

You used to say that as part of your show? Yeah!

As soon as I get on stage. Everybody in the crowd say, "No!"

I read an interview where you said you'd done about ten years...

I have, altogether. ..behind bars. Altogether?

Altogether, I've done ten years. From the age of, what, 13?

12. 127

Mm-hm. Age of 12.

See, I found out my father wasn't my father cos I thought my stepdaddy

was my daddy till I was 12.

My uncle got out of prison when I was 12

and he told me that my stepdaddy wasn't my daddy.

So I was living in a house... why did your mum...?

She didn't want me knowing my daddy cos my daddy ain't shit.

That spun you out? At that point... Yeah. straight to the hood.

On the streets, I'm bucking.

I don't listen to nothing none of y'all say. I do what I want to do.

Why? Why'd you all lie to me?

You don't get to pick my life for me.

Now I'm going to pick my own life.

I ain't proud of everything that I did in the past,

but it made me who I am, so I stand on it. OK.

You've been listening to any of this?

I've listened to a great deal of it.

Do you have a perspective on,

you know, from seeing him coming and going,

what it was that was keeping him coming back

or keeping him in the streets?

Typically, the surroundings,

most of the time the people that they hang around.

Obviously, Kwame's very talented, intelligent - you know,

he's got a lot of natural advantages -

and yet he's been getting into trouble quite a bit.

I think when he does his time, he'll be a regular,

you know, celebrity, just like the ones we see now.

How you doing? Louis. How you doing? I'm Savon.

Savon, nice to meet you. Nice to meet you too.

Out in the main area of the jail,

I met Foogiano's oldest friend, Savon.

What we were talking about was the fact

that Kwame was nationally famous.

You know, he was having a lot of success,

and the double blow of not just having this setback

but at a time when he was poised to take it to the next level, right?

Why?

The problems happened then?

A lot of my other partners used to be jealous about it,

like, "Why I don't get to hold the money?"

Jealousy, envy - you know, it be that.

People ain't going to show it, but you can... you can tell it.

So there's petty jealousies? It's petty jealousy.

And that creates an ill feeling,

if you feel like you're not getting enough.

You got any advice to offer Kwame?

Leaving Foogiano, I found myself reflecting on the chaos

and jealousy that resulted when sudden success

came to people in areas deprived of money and opportunity...

...and the strangeness of a world where stardom and incarceration

could be so closely intertwined.

It's intrinsic to the trap scene that its artists are often close

to the high-risks behaviour they report on

and can continue to get caught up in it.

The ultimate example had been the Orlando artist 9lokkNine.

Charged with five counts of attempted murder

involving the family of an alleged rival

and looking at a possible 100 years in jail,

he was the rapper allegedly most closely linked to

the gang politics of his city.

Shots going to start going off. Boop, boop, boop!

Now word came that he'd agreed to speak to me,

in the company of his lawyers.

There he is. Hey! How's it going? Good to see you. I'm good.

Louis. How you doing? Nice to meet you, Glock.

I'm good. How's it going?

You OK sitting down there? That'd be good.

All right, just as a reminder, when we first spoke about this interview,

I told you what?

You said you don't want to...get nothing that's going to incriminate me.

I don't want you to say anything incriminating.

I didn't even want you to do the interview, right? Uh-huh.

You told me you wanted to do it anyway, right? Yeah.

We've been trying to catch up with you for a while,

so it's very nice to get a bit of time with you.

9lokkNine is your... My stage name.

What's your actual birth name? Jacquavius.

I mean, a Glock is a gun, right? Yeah.

Yeah. Could that prejudice a court? Is that an issue?

Well, I mean, I think so. You know, I'm...

I'm certain as we go into trial, they're probably

going to try to portray it not as a stage name but as reality.

Indicative of a kind of murderous, gun-toting mentality?

They're trying to suggest that life is now imitating art.

So Dan and I, what we need to do is we need to get them

to take the blinders off and look at all of the evidence.

And if you look at all the evidence, hopefully they'll see it as we do

and this guy here's a free man.

How many rappers it is with gun in their name? Tech.

Tech N9ne, mm-hm. Cee Murdaa -

I mean, imagine if you had murder in your name. Yeah.

I know who you talkin' about.

That would look bad in front of a jury.

So which was the song that really blew up?

Like, how did you kind of break through, would you say?

First it was Jet House Blues, but then I came back with Crayola.

It... Next level? Yeah.

Crayola's the one where the guy's got a bag over his head

and he gets shot? Yeah.

Should we look at the Crayola video now?

Yeah, we can look at it.

# Like some paper, I swear I won't never fold, yeah

# Do what you gon' do No Crayola, it get violent.

# My shooters real steppers, tip-toeing, move in silence

# Chewing on his teeth, molly's eating up his body

# He move or even look wrong, Lil 30 spot him, pop him

# Do what you gon' do No Crayola, it get violent... #

Crayola is what? A fake gangster?

No. Crayola? That's crayons.

Right, but it's also a metaphor.

Nah. It was wordplay. "No Crayola, it get violent,"

the colour violet. Mm-hm.

Instead of saying violet, I said violent.

The interpretation I made of it is Crayola is like someone

who wears the colours of a gang, but they don't...

They aren't really that.

Nah. It weren't that, nah.

Look me in the eyes and say that. Oh, nah, nah. Seriously?

No, I swear it weren't that. You did a rap song about crayons?

Cos it's the way I used it, though! Like, all right...

You're going to look at me and tell me you blew up with a rap song...

Yeah, it's really about. ..that was about colouring with crayons?

Yeah. I promise.

I'd be trying to use wordplay. Like, I be trying to make...

What is the lyric after that?

"He move or even look wrong, Lil' 30 spot him, pop him."

That's not about colouring, that bit.

Oh, no, no, no, the first... The first bar was about colouring.

But the next one, like the next couple of bars,

it wasn't about colouring. It was more about...?

Like, I ain't never really think about that, breaking the song down.

Is there a difference between you

and sort of the rap persona that you have?

I do both.

I talk about my life when it comes to, like,

the stuff I had to do to get to where I'm at,

but half of that stuff, I don't... I don't be doing.

I don't indulge in it. Where I'm from, that'll get you

a long amount of time in jail if you talk about that stuff,

so I don't...

I don't mix street with music.

I keep music...business, business and streets, streets.

Should we look at the video? If you'd like to.

So what are we looking at?

This is a video from a home security system of a home

that is diagonally across the street from the home

that they're accusing Glokk of being one of the shooters.

This was a house that was shot up,

and there was a woman and her daughter inside.

There was five people inside, a woman and four of her children.

So you can see that's the cars as they're pulling up.

Right over here, you're going to see some muzzle flashes in a second.

Those are the flashes. Yep.

It's almost like the noise makes the camera move.

And your contention - just to be clear - is you...

You were nowhere, you weren't there. At all.

At all?

The eyewitness places Glokk at the... At the scene?

Yes.

That's making you laugh.

Oh, nah. I was... Nah, I was looking at the video. But...

We're not... We're not going to talk about the video right now.

Nah, I wasn't... When I say "we", I mean you.

Nah, I wasn't saying nothing, though. I was just... It's funny.

And the state narrative is that there's a gang rivalry,

between the gang that you affiliate with

and another outfit which is affiliated with Hotboii,

and that there is, for whatever reason,

animosity, leading to conflict.

The police officers, they're trying to make it seem like

it's gang-related, to try to put the faces behind it -

cos they know me and Hotboii, like, we got status, we up there,

you feel me?

It's a whole bunch of other stuff that can cause stuff

other than just saying, like, gang feuds and stuff like that.

But from your knowledge,

being in the streets, from probably, what, 13 or so,

what can you say about what's behind the conflict that does exist?

Nowadays, it's like a teenager get that gun in their hand,

all they know is they want to shoot.

You never know who's coming to get you, who hate on you.

Out of what reason? Just hate, hating? That's why...

That's why I use the term "Loyalty kills love."

How, like, if you ain't loyal to me, you can't show me loyalty.

Loyalty beats love any day to me.

What does loyalty mean to you?

It's certain scenarios that, like...

I can't really explain it right now.

Say if somebody was to shoot, you'd stand in front

of that bullet right now for me - that's loyalty.

Do you have more to worry about in terms of the authorities

or in terms of the streets?

Ah... The police got my full attention right now.

You're not worried about street stuff?

I don't worry about the street stuff at all.

But that's how most rappers are dying when they die.

Like, rap... Those rappers who get shot,

nine times out of ten, it's from street business, right?

So why wouldn't that worry you? Nah...

Not the streets. Streets, nah.

Streets the last thing I worry about.

It was hard to square the image of the mild-seeming young man I'd met

with the criminal conduct outlined in the cases against him.

Only time would tell whether he would ever put

the cycle of incarceration behind him and be able to pursue

a long and successful career in music.

LAUGHS: I love this shit. Welcome home, kid!

I was back with the aspiring rapper Peso Lucianno.

At a studio near Tampa, I joined him and Drew

and some of their friends for a recording session.

# I be here trappin', drivin' foreigns

# Still ain't got no license

# Nobody care you got a gun That shit is not excitin'

# Niggas know me, talking down I know you don't like me

# From the grave, when you see me, you gonna try to ice me

# I bet if I go back to prison, all y'all bitches... #

Peso is out. Mm-hm.

I mean, what's happening now? He's recording?

He's recording, he's going to get into the music zone.

Get in the music world. Mm-hm.

So, you know... He know what he got to do.

What does he...? What does he have to do?

Just stay focused. Stay focused. Treat it like a 9-5.

So if you grind, you're learning in the industry,

so you're going to continue to grow as an artist.

Record a bunch of music. And he's going to take care of his family,

his friends. People that he don't even know he could take care of,

he can take care of now, you know what I'm saying? Mm-hm.

So it's going to be... It's going to be a good thing.

The power of the rap art form comes from its authentic expression

of real struggles, its status - to use the words of Ratchet Roach -

as "factual pain music",

giving voice to those who come from areas of hardship.

SHOUTING AND LAUGHTER

In a world connected through social media,

where artists can reach thousands of fans directly,

its closeness to the conditions it chronicles carries its own risk.

But in leaving Florida, I was mainly struck by its power

to reflect real life, offering opportunities to progress,

laying bare the disenfranchisement of a generation with eloquent rage.

GUNSHOTS