xxxtentacion: an electric guitar in a world of acoustics. an exxxception to the rules. he could have done anything. he could have been hitler. he could have led people in any way — imagine him in twenty years if he’d cleaned up his act. i bet he took deep breaths. it’s cool he got shot and didn’t suicide. he has songs from when he was 16 that are sick. what other teenagers wrote great literature besides mary shelley and Rimbaud? we will never know what he would have chosen — but we know that he had explored every option when it came to emotions. he was everywhere all over the scale and spectrum, hopping genres and points of view. he wasn’t a dish — he was a menu. he didn’t die at 20yrs old. he died at 7,000. you have to imagine that he was only gonna become only smarter and more anti- and more critical and more clear. i wish he had made a curb your enthusiasm. he said to that girl in the new miami times ‘the word is dumbfounded.’ such a slick move! he lived a hell of a life. he was special. yes he left early but it seems so like him to leave the party three hours early without telling anyone. what wild and unpredictable turns he took musically. the new york times will call him a devil. but I and many others saw angel. a raw nerve, pinging panging, pain, raw, shooting pain, a finger in a wound, a twist of a knife. whether he was courageous or possessed, i don’t care. was he self-destructive or sacrificed? i don’t care. so much energy. in the long winding river of humanity, he was a waterfall. i’ll say it before and i’ll say it again — it’s cool he was shot and not suicided. more lennon than Cobain, no matter how much he sung about depression Burk Zanft Follow Jun 19, 2018 · 10 min read

His mother’s name, cleopatra, was tattooed across his sternum. It was an ugly tattoo, and he was an ugly guy. But he was beautiful. He was tender, raw, an open nerve. Remember that movie 147 hours? Remember that piercing high pitched sound when James Franco was cutting through his arm and he got to his tendon? That was the sound of x’s life. A high, painful, wailing screech — a feeling more intense than most of us will ever know. He had, either through bravery or possession, the will to let flow what most of us keep bottled up. In the river of humanity, he was a waterfall.

Listen to the way he enunciates the ‘b’ in ‘bones’ in his lyric ‘broken hearts break bones’ in his song Garette’s revenge. A song he was singing onstage a year ago when he got clocked in the face by some dickhead who had bribed security to get backstage. He was shirtless, and barefoot — vulnerable, raw — opened up, and he got knocked out. They won’t find his killer — they didn’t find Malcolm X’s, did they? Did they find biggie’s or Tupacs? They found John lennon’s, but — Lennon’s was white, crazy, and hung around the scene of the crime. Everyone who preaches love gets assassinated.

I wish I had gone to meet him in florida. He did an interview with the Miami new times a month before he died. The girl who interviewed him only included a handful of quotes EVEN THOUGH SHE SPENT HOURS WITH HIM— her long profile piece was mostly pulled from other interviews. It seemed as though no one got his story right. Everyone is too obsessed with his domestic violence charges.

His breakout song was called ‘look at me’ — is there a better three word encapsulation of this millennial and post-millennial social media generation? ‘Look at me’. He said he used to get in fights at school to get his mother to pay attention to him. THE WHOLE POINT OF SOCIAL MEDIA IS TO GET PEOPLE TO LOOK AT YOU WHILE YOU PRETEND YOU DON’T CARE IF THEY LOOK AT YOU — AND HE SAID, OPENLY, ‘LOOK AT ME.’

A friend of mine pointed out this hypocrisy: many of the righteous bloggers and tweeters who condemn him for his abuse charges also harp on and on about how systemic oppression creates monsters, disadvantages people, gives them no chance — and then they see XXXtentacion, who bounced around homes his whole childhood, his mother too young and too black and too poor and too stupid to take care of him; his time in jail on drug charges in his mid-teens, his time in jail on abuse charges, his entire life a ‘product of the system,’ and they attack him for being some remorseless piece of shit toxic male abuser. They can’t have it both ways. If the system is rigged, then it was rigged against him.

Yet he came out and sang — he preached his positivity. His pleasantness. His hope that everyone could feel what he felt, that he could help people somehow. Honestly I found it a bit sickening, a little too saccharine, a little too contradictory — at the time. Now, when I listen to his diatribes, spoken into an iPhone front-facing camera that would look at him, when no one else would, in the media or in his personal life, I don’t think it’s as corny as I did when he was alive. Maybe death does make heroes of us all, but THIS KID WAS SPECIAL. AND HIS FANS KNOW IT. THEY’RE OUT THERE. THEY AREN’T WRITING THE BLOG POSTS, THEY AREN’T MORALIZING ABOUT HIM, AND THEY NEVER WOULD. THE MAJORITY, AS USUAL, IS SILENT.

“Can’t seem to explain a thing going on in my head,” he sang. For someone so tongue-tied, he sure was prolific, WASN’T HE? I stopped engaging, really, last August. I didn’t like ’17’ that much, I didn’t listen to it that much, and I didn’t listen to ‘?’ either. But just look at those two album titles. ’17’ and ‘?’. THE MAN WAS GETTING TO THE POINT. I played his ‘Revenge EP’ all last summer. I was absolutely hypnotized by him when I first heard him. I couldn’t fathom that someone could go from the blaring hip hop deconstruction and reconstruction of ‘Look at me’ to the acoustic soul-splitting of ‘Garette’s Revenge.’ He sang ‘broken hearts break bones.’ Is there any better lyric re: violence and its causes?

I wrote this after he got punched in the face onstage a year ago:

WE NEED THIS MAN : A Review of XXXTentacion’s “Revenge EP”

We just witnessed a crime against humanity. Some fatherless fuck just punched XXXTentacion in the face with a bitch-ass six-step (at least) running start while our (allegedly) armed-robber, (allegedly) girlfriend-strangling barefoot shirtless hero sang his heart out on Garette’s Revenge, the exact opposite (and logical successor) to Look At Me, his huge hit. Fucking up XXX’s brain is worse than ISIS destroying the Roman amphiteatre in Palmyra. This is what happens in a fucked-up country like America where peasants can punch aristocrats in the face….But that’s a story for another time. All you need to know is, XXX is an aristocrat.

I know all about the charges against him and the phone calls from jail where he giggles after saying that bitch is making it up, the bitch he strangled and kidnapped and bribed (allegedly) while she was pregnant. But have you heard his ‘Revenge’ EP?

If you’re all hung up on his (allegedly) being an awful person, read that Pitchfork article and hate him.

’Cause I’m here to talk about the music. You can all suck my dick if you don’t suck XXX’s. No one has shown this kind of versatility since Amy Winehouse. And same goes for simple and plain writing…lyricism as they used to call it. While everyone else was choosing their words carefully XXX was just saying them. “That little bitch got her throat fucked” isn’t delivered with any more energy than any other line in the song. He’s cold and measured at a level of screaming face-melting energy other rappers need 45 takes to sustain for one bar.

And then after that perfect goddamn song “look at me”, a song that makes chief keef sound like a lullaby, with a hook that snapchats snapchat, he slips right into “I don’t wanna do this anymore.” Look up the lyrics, i had to. Let’s see drake do this, let’s see him get so naked. Let’s see any of these r and b singers besides D’Angelo. It might not make you cry but it will puff your lips out. Six lines:

I should’ve let you know, that you’re my only one

I know you’re feeling numb, I’ll fuck you till you cum

Said, “I don’t understand, how you don’t got a man.”

You want me in your bed, ’cause I’ve been in your head

You’ve been up all night, so you don’t wanna wait on me

I’m bouta’ catch my flight, so you don’t gotta wait on me

Oh and two more, that would sound awful coming out of anyone else’s mouth:

I’ve been up a very long time, wonder why they hate on me

I don’t wanna love myself, I’m praying that they all love me

And the next song starts off like something Talking Heads would have made and ends up with XXX sounding like a mix between Justin Bieber and the chopped-up voices David Guetta used to use. That’s “Looking For a Star.” Diplo produced it and X steps up major showing off another completely different sound, you cocksuckas.

And then we slip into “Valentine.” What band do you think it sounds like? I heard Radiohead. Show me another artist with this kind of range and I will tattoo your face on my balls.

Valentine, I watched my red rose turn to gray

Let me be, I give your Lord my soul to take

It won’t hurt me now, I’m numb to all the pain

Heaven or hell, I don’t know which path to take

You can see that the guy liked Cobain. And may I remind you, last song he sounded like David Guetta and the song before he sounded like what all these half-rapper/singers think they sound like? And before that he put Chief Keef to sleep screaming THAT LITTLE BITCH GOT HER THROAT FUCKED? Make your parents listen to this EP. No one is doing this. No one has ever done this.

And then we get “King,” track five. Does that start with the same sample as Kid Cudi’s “man on the moon?” He says, “i’m not in love, I won’t let you control what I want.” There’s no drums until half way through, and then, boy oh boy, does the song change. He starts screaming his goddamn head off. In the drumless parts he speaks for the ego…it destroys all in its path. And when the drum kicks in, he sounds like the ego. Loud, catchy, and petrifying for its catchiness.

Then we get “Slipknot.” His 90’s pure hiphop piece. The piano riffs included. Who’s he sound like? Nas and AZ on “Life’s a Bitch.” Blow him, hip hop heads. He rocked your shit too. “Won’t fall my nigga, I slip not.” His first friend kinda fucks it up but the second one catches enough of X’s vibe, which means every line you spit should sound like a second-story crowd dive.

Next is “Yung Bratz.” This is the song Tyler the Creator used to pretend he could make before he went fully pastel and left all the black-and-white behind.

And last is “RIP Roach.” It’s another soft song, another instance where he cruises into guitarists’ territory and sinks their battleship. Before it starts you should turn your volume all the way up so you can hear every word. His friend Ski Mask does a decent job but no one cares, we’re here for XXX.

So yeah, listen to those eight songs and see if you hear some tenderness from this vicious woman beater.

And then listen to Garette’s Revenge, the song he made after getting out of jail a few months ago. It’s either about some friend he knows who killed herself or some girl he dated and (allegedly) fucked up. Whatever. The beat sounds like something he stole from Jack Johnson.

This was the song he was singing, barefoot, beautifully vulnerable, when he was sucker punched BY A RANCID PIECE OF SHIT.

Let’s all celebrate XXX and wish him a speedy recovery. Yes he’s (allegedly) a horrible person but he has a goddamn talent. This is that rare example of the criminal who needs love more than he needs punishment. This is someone we all need to rally behind. Let this fool know how much we need him. Because he needs us.

I wish I had gotten to tell him what he meant. I wish there was a publishing world that would let these opinions out.

If it was a crime against humanity to punch him onstage and give his brilliant brain a concussion, what was it to shoot him?

I will say this — I saw the video of him dead in the car. His head was tilted back, his mouth was open. He looked like he was sleeping. He looked peaceful. And you could see no blood.

Finally, after a painful life, he looked painless.

But we’re all still here — and if we know what’s good for us, we’ll take a cue or two from this kid.

In the river of humanity, he was a waterfall. Oh — and it was really cool he didn’t do music videos.

May he rest in peace, and may the rest of us stew in violence, the way he did. Hopefully, we’ll reckon with it as well as he did. He seemed to be coming out the other side, transforming into something that transcends all the shit poor Florida garbage he was born amongst. But now we will never know — and I blame you, all of you, who didn’t love him while we had him.

I hope you all get it right next time. But I doubt you will.

And to the people who understand me, and who understand him: we’re still here. Thank you. And, you’re welcome. Let the vultures pick at his carcass. They’ve been hovering for a long time. He was always dead in their eyes. And in ours, he’s always been alive.

“mama raised a soldier, not a bitch, not a bitch”