The Black Rapper and the White Boy He Lynched

The people call him X.  The name he does music under, xxxTentacion, is too hard for his horde of fans to pronounce, so…… X.   X’s dad was never around to take care of X’s mom, and X’s mom could never take care of X, so X was raised by his Grandma in Plantation, Florida.  Jasheh Onfroy was born from a multi racial heritage, true integration through generations of blood.  He had dropped out of High School by tenth grade.  He was arrested on several charges before the age of 18.  Locked up in juvy hall a couple times, X carried no hope, no money, no plans.   Having shown zero musical talent as a youth, nor any musical interest past an occasional choir practice in middle school, one day in 2014 X buys a Blue brand mic from Amazon.  Jahseh Dwayne Onfroy then downloaded Garage Band onto his student model laptop: xxxTentacion was born.

Like any kid, black or white, X started a free Soundcloud page.  His first upload to Soundcloud is a clumsy joke of a song. No one shows any real interest.  Why would they?  Soundcloud has over 150 million free tunes.  Why listen to his?  xxxTentacion uploads more songs, including “snippets," small incomplete rambling ideas.  He goes through many songwriting styles, ballads, acoustic, alternative, rap.   More songs, more styles, more uploads.  No one seems to care.  Suddenly something strange happens to X’s music career.  He finds an identity.  

X got arrested for allegedly beating his pregnant girlfriend senseless, then supposedly choking her, transporting her to a location against her will where xxxTentacion locked her up for two days before she finally escaped.  Pretty wild stuff.  Wild stuff makes people talk online.  In those vile online exchanges about the reprehensible, violent behavior of this “scumbag kid” beating his pregnant girlfriend, people started looking at the accused criminals Soundcloud page.  People were finally listening to the music of the artist xxxTentacion.   Sitting poor, disenfranchised, jailed, X’s popularity swelled while he was locked up.  That’s right, locked up.  He was NOT on a promotional tour.  He had NOT dropped a new album, there was NO video. X was in jail and blowing up online, Big Time.

Out of ALL the online communities that supported X in his violent pregnant female beating outburst, the Rap community seemed to stand by him the strongest.  The Rap community seemed to understand him.  Seemed to side with him, especially on social media.  Adam22 watches social media.  Adam22 knows social media.  Adam22 works social media.  Acting like your typical white guy, Adam Grandmaison moved in quickly securing his new asset. 

To make phone calls in jail, you need a calling card.  Someone has to buy you that calling card.  Rolling Stone magazine calls Adam Grandmaison aka Adam22 THE “underground hip hop tastemaker.”  Adam22 had many conversations with X while X was locked up in jail.  We don’t know if Adam22 purchased the calling cards that enabled the long conversations, or if he paid the bail money to get X out, but we do know that Mr. Grandmaison talked young X into an agreement while he was locked up.  Adam22 was now the proud manager of the musical artist xxxTentacion. The agreement was verbal.  The physical details, the money, the contracts, that would all be handled later in a lawyer’s office, a lawyer’s office in Beverly Hills.    

On March 26, 2017, Jahseh “X” Onfroy was released from incarceration a new man.  A different man.  A black man.  Jahseh is actually an integral mix of Indian German Egyptian Jamaican Italian blood, so, as far as his ethnicity goes, it’s a real toss up.  However Adam22 the young white “hip hop tastemaker," already knew what color he wanted his new artist to be.  Black.  “Rap is really about character-building more than anything else.  I like to compare it to characters in wrestling."  Adam Grandmaison’s initial plan for X was not new or imaginative.  A record release followed by a tour.  Bad news for Adam tho.  The tour didn’t work.  X turned out to be a little wild on the road.  X beat up “fans”.  “Fans” and rivals came to shows to beat up X.  Someone got stabbed. The tour was cancelled, but X blamed it on “his cousin being shot," not the real time violence that accompanied him on tour.  With live performances out, and with his Rapper’s reputation darker than ever, Adam22’s next move for his bad boy black rap character xxxTentacion would be his most outrageous yet.  Adam texted James Pereira at JMP productions. “I got a great idea for X.  When are you down to start filming?”  

“Young white male, age 6-10 needed for a serious artful lynching scene.  Must perform own stunt.  Cannot be afraid of heights or black men. Non-SAG shoot. One days work. Pays scale,” the casting call read.  After no one answered it, they switched to direct booking, which means calling people.  The casting director LaShawnna Stanley had a real hard time casting the JMP film production, even using direct booking because, “With all the racial tension in the world” people were “nervous."  Racial tension wrapped around taught nerves, the exact chord that white Adam22, latino James Pereira, and mixed race xxxTentacion were looking to strike when they finally found the white stage mother who “understood the concept” of “impact.” Committing her young, white, 8 year old son to being lynched “wholeheartedly."    

On the job during pre-production,  Daisy Blane, a lowly production assistant, sings a melody into the Sing True app on her iPhone.  Daisy should be printing drafts for approval on the upcoming video shoot for xxxTentacion’s most popular song Look at Me, but instead she is recording a melody she hears as being her first number one hit.  Suddenly she is startled by a text “we need you in here NOW”.  When Daisy stumbles into the small conference room frazzled,  trying not to forget her hit song, she is unaware that the iPhone in her pocket is still clearly, digitally recording everything being said in the room.  

I cannot print a transcript of that private meeting on the advice of a $600 an hour lawyer, but I can tell you this.  

I did NOT buy a burner phone.    

I did NOT make an anonymous Dropbox.

I did NOT get Daisy to Dropbox me the recording.     

I did NOT download the recording onto the burner phone.  

I did NOT transcribe that recording.    

I did NOT destroy that burner phone.
I am not sharing any PART OF THAT RECORDING with you here.

“Yeah, but you know me.  I’m not actually black.” 

“I know, that’s why in the opening scene we have you in the slave chain necklace so people will immediately think you are black.  We all know you’re not black, but with you wearing the slave chain everyone will think you are.”

“Yeah, but why do I have to be black?  Feel me? I’m not even a black man.  As an artist, I want to be genuine, universal, real.  Feel me?”

“I know.  You are super talented _____ (artist).  We’ll get to all that other stuff later.  Right now we need you to play the part for this video, that’s all.   We’re going for outrage here ____(artist), get people angry, mad, trigger them.  Get paid.”

“Yeah, I know. I like that.” 

“Believe me, people are going to get pissed when they see this shit.  Hanging the white kid is perfect, really perfect, but listen _____ (artist) the scene won’t work unless the audience thinks you are black.  You have to be black, or it just won’t work.  Picture a dark skinned Egyptian guy hanging a little white kid.  It’s just a sick murder scene, but when you do it as a black man, channeling your black American rage, you are lynching all the white people by lynching that one little white kid.  It’s not just sadistic child murder.  You are getting your own personal revenge on the white man for every bad thing that has ever happened to you because of him.  When we frame the kid’s murder like that,  the murder becomes a killing and the killing becomes justified.  If you aren’t black in the video, specifically American black, the visual just won’t work.  If you string the kid up without the context of black American rage, it looks like a psycho sadistic dark skinned Egyptian guy choking a white boy to death with a rope for the fuck of it.  So in the very first scene of the video we have to establish you as 100% Black. That’s why we came up with the idea of you wearing the stylized slave chain in the first scene.  The slave chain is a black no brainer.  They see the slave chain on you and bam, you’re black, you’re done, it’s over and now that you’ve been established as being black, you have every valid reason to commit every act of brutal violence that follows.  Lynching the white kid becomes good, acceptable.  Hell, for all we know _____ (artist) you might go from pregnant girlfriend beating scumbag to social justice hero,”  (laughter).

Jahseh Dwayne Onfroy, aka xxxTentacion, X, successfully lynched a white boy for his “Look at Me” video.  

The video went live on youtube September 12, 2017.  As of this date it has over 10 million views.    

Adam Grandmaison, aka Adam22, the tatted up white “Hip hop tastemaker” does his podcast No Jumper often.  His social media presence makes him easy to find.  

James Pereira/JMP productions gets paid to do work. James also spends time posting pics of hot models on Instagram.

The stage mom who let her kid get lynched?  She has three kids.  God help them.  Most stage moms will suck every drop of life from their poor little helpless meal tickets who “REALLY DO, know what they are getting into."  Hopefully the kid that got hung won’t develop an inferiority complex, or worse yet pull a David Carradine 20 years from now battling the demons created by his Mom’s white exorcism.  

The Great American Racial Divide continues to pay.  Well...

Arthur C. Burnright