Earl Simmons (December 18, 1970 – April 9, 2021), known as DMX, was an American rapper and actor. He began rapping in the early 1990s and released his debut album “It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot” in 1998, to both critical acclaim and commercial success, selling 251,000 copies within its first week of release. Overall, DMX sold over 74 million records worldwide.
Earl Simmons was born in either Baltimore, Maryland, or Mount Vernon, New York, depending on what you read, to 19-year-old Arnett Simmons and 18-year-old Joe Barker. His father was an artist who painted watercolor paintings of street scenes to sell at local fairs. Barker moved to Philadelphia and was largely absent from Earl’s life.
As a child, Earl Simmons suffered greatly from bronchial asthma.
Simmons went through a rough childhood that included being beaten by his mother and her various boyfriends so badly that he lost teeth and sustained numerous bruises and cuts on his face. Due to their extreme poverty, he slept on the floor with roaches and mice crawling over him in the night.
When he was six years old, his mother knocked out two of his teeth with a broom after he erased something in her notebook. At school, he threw chairs at teachers and stabbed another child in the face with a pencil. When he was seven, he was jailed for stealing cakes from a market.
One summer, his mother locked him in his bedroom, allowing him to only exit for trips to the bathroom. At the end of the fifth grade, at age 10, Simmons was expelled from school and sent to the Julia Dyckman Andrus Children’s Home for 18 months. In what he later described as a defining moment of betrayal, his mother tricked him by telling him they were just visiting the home, then she enrolled him there. A few months later, he was arrested for arson in an attempt to burn the school down, he nearly killed his co-conspirator.
When he was 14, Earl Simmons began living on the streets of Yonkers to escape his mother’s abuse, sleeping in Salvation Army clothing bins and befriending stray dogs.
Shortly after he began doing this, his mother once again sent him to a group home. During his stay, Earl Simmons bonded with other students from New York over their shared love of hip hop music. After performing for his friends, they encouraged Simmons to continue writing music.
As a freshman at Yonkers Middle High School, DMX was the second-fastest on the track and field varsity team but had bad grades and a sparse attendance record.
He turned to robbery as a way to get out of poverty and by the end of the year, he attended school just to rob people and was robbing three people per day. He later turned to carjacking.
1984–1996: Career beginnings
Earl Simmons got his start in the music industry at age 14, in 1984, when he beatboxed for Ready Ron, a local rapper, who asked him to become his partner. Simmons chose the name “DMX”, which came from an instrument he had used at the boys’ home, the Oberheim DMX drum machine. It later was also interpreted as “Dark Man X”. After serving time in prison for stealing a dog, he began writing his own lyrics and performing at the local recreation center for younger children. In 1988, while in prison for carjacking, he began dedicating almost all of his free time to writing lyrics and also meeting and rapping with K-Solo. When he was released that summer, he began producing and selling his own mixtapes where he rapped over instrumentals from other songs and sold them on street corners, which helped him build a local fan base all over New York. DMX made an appearance on The Stretch Armstrong and Bobbito Show in 1991 with Percee P, where they both freestyled. DMX would later that year release a demo tape that featured “Spellbound” along with “Critical Condition”, “Three Little Pigs”, “The Original Author of Spellbound” and “Unstoppable Force”. It featured a style similar to Big Daddy Kane and Rakim, unlike his later material. In 1991, The Source magazine praised DMX in its Unsigned Hype column that highlighted unsigned hip-hop artists. That same year, Columbia Records signed DMX to its subsidiary label Ruffhouse Records, which released his debut single “Born Loser”. He released his second single, “Make a Move” in 1994. He made a guest appearance alongside Jay-Z, Ja Rule, and Mic Geronimo on the classic underground track “Time to Build” on Mic Geronimo’s debut album in 1995.
1996–2000: Signing with Def Jam and commercial success
DMX recorded tracks from September 1996 to January 1998 for his debut album. During this time, his guest appearances on Mase’s singles “24 Hrs. to Live” and “Take What’s Yours”, The LOX’s single “Money, Power & Respect”, and LL Cool J’s single “4, 3, 2, 1” created a strong buzz for the then-unsigned rapper. In February 1998, he released his debut major-label single, “Get at Me Dog”, on Def Jam Recordings. His first major-label album, “It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot”, which included the single “Ruff Ryders’ Anthem”, was then released in May 1998. The album debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 chart in the U.S. and sold over five million copies. In December 1998, he released his second album, “Flesh of My Flesh, Blood of My Blood” which debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 and went multi-platinum. He released his third and best-selling album “… And Then There Was X”, on December 21, 1999, his third album to debut at number one on the Billboard 200. Its most popular single, “Party Up (Up in Here)”, became his first Top Ten hit on the R&B charts, and was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Rap Solo Performance at the 2001 Grammy Awards. The album was certified six-times Platinum and was nominated for Best Rap Album at the 2001 Grammy Awards. In 2000, DMX also made a cameo appearance in the Sum 41 music video for “Makes No Difference”.
2001–2004: Return to music
DMX returned to the studio to complete his fourth album, “The Great Depression” which was released on October 23, 2001 and was his fourth album to debut at number one on the Billboard 200, featuring the singles “Who We Be”, “We Right Here”, and “Shorty Was The Bomb”. Despite the album’s triple Platinum certification, its commercial and critical success was lower than his previous album. His fifth album, “Grand Champ”, released in September 2003, also debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 and included the singles “Where the Hood At?” and “Get It on the Floor”. After its release, he informed the public that he planned to retire and that “Grand Champ” was his final album.
2005–2011: Year of the Dog…Again and The Definition of X
DMX signed to Columbia Records in January 2006. He recorded his next album, “Year of the Dog… Again”, while switching record labels, which caused numerous delays. It was released on August 1, 2006 and missed the number one Billboard spot by only a few hundred copies. He released two more singles, “Lord Give Me a Sign” and “We in Here”.
On June 12, 2008, Def Jam Recordings released a compilation of his greatest hits, “The Definition of X: The Pick of the Litter”. In 2011, Def Jam released another compilation album, “The Best of DMX”, which featured hit singles including “Where the Hood At?” and “X Gon’ Give It to Ya”.
In 2009, DMX claimed he would pursue preaching in Jersey City, New Jersey as well as continue to produce music. According to MTV, he had semi-retired to study the Bible more in an effort to give messages behind the pulpit.
2011–2013: Undisputed
On October 11, 2011, DMX performed at the 2011 BET Hip Hop Awards and said that he has been working “nonstop, every day” on his seventh album, which was later titled “Undisputed”. A video for a new track entitled “Last Hope” was released via the Internet on September 24, 2011 and was later included on “The Weigh In” EP released digitally on May 5, 2012.
In late February 2012, Seven Arts Pictures acquired the catalog of DMX’s music and signed DMX to a two-album deal. During a performance at New York’s Santos Party House on December 25, 2011, DMX stated that the new album would be titled “Undisputed” and would be released on March 26, 2012. After numerous delays, the album was eventually released on September 11, 2012, and featured production from Swizz Beatz and J.R. Rotem with a guest appearance by MGK.
2013–2021: Def Jam reunion and Exodus
In 2013, DMX announced he had begun working on his eighth studio album. He collaborated with producers Swizz Beatz and Dame Grease. In December, after regaining his passport, he embarked on a world tour with performances in Bulgaria and Kosovo. On January 7, 2015, Seven Arts Music announced that DMX would be releasing “Redemption of the Beast” the following week, however, close personal friend and recurring collaborator producer/rapper/entrepreneur Swizz Beatz and DMX’s management confirmed that this was false. On January 13, 2015, Seven Arts Music released “Redemption of the Beast”, without acquiring a legal artist contract. On January 15, 2015, it was announced by DMX’s brother/manager Montana that DMX was no longer signed to Seven Arts Music and that they would be taking legal action against Seven Arts Music for the unauthorized release of “Redemption of the Beast”.
DMXs 2003 song “X Gon’ Give It to Ya” was featured in the 2016 film Deadpool and in its trailers. On June 28, 2016, DMX released a new song titled “Blood Red” which was produced by Divine Bars. On January 11, 2017, DMX released a new song produced by Swizz Beats titled “Bain Iz Back”. On September 20, 2019, DMX signed a new record deal with Def Jam Recordings, reuniting with the label for the first time since his 2003.
DMX’s eighth and first posthumous studio album Exodus was released through Def Jam on May 28, 2021.
DMX was featured in films such as Belly, Romeo Must Die, Exit Wounds, Cradle 2 the Grave, and Last Hour. In 2006, he starred in the reality television series DMX: Soul of a Man, which was primarily aired on the BET cable television network Never Die Alone. In 2003, he published a book of his memoirs entitled E.A.R.L.: The Autobiography of DMX.
DMX was the father of 17 children from 11 different women.
Over the years DMX was in jail 30 times for various offenses, including robbery, assault, carjacking, animal cruelty, reckless driving, driving under the influence, unlicensed driving, drug possession, probation violation, failure to pay child support, pretending to be a federal agent, and tax evasion.
DMX said he became addicted to crack cocaine when he was 14 years old, after Ready Ron tricked him into smoking a marijuana cigarette laced with the drug. He entered drug rehabilitation several times including in 2002, 2017, and 2019, when he cancelled concerts.
On February 10, 2016, DMX was found unresponsive in a Ramada Inn parking lot in Yonkers, New York. He was resuscitated by first responders and intravenously given Narcan, an opioid-reversal drug, responded quickly, became semi-conscious and was then rushed to the hospital. DMX stated that the cause was an asthma attack.
On April 2, 2021, at approximately 11:00 pm, DMX was rushed to White Plains Hospital, where he was reported to be in critical condition following a heart attack at his home possibly resulting from a drug overdose. The next day, his attorney Murray Richman confirmed Simmons was on life support, and the same night, DMX suffered cerebral hypoxia (oxygen deprivation to his brain) as paramedics attempted to resuscitate him for 30 minutes. DMXs former manager, Nakia Walker, said he was in a “vegetative state” with “lung and brain failure and no current brain activity”. His manager, Steve Rifkind, stated Simmons was comatose and that he was set to undergo tests to determine his brain’s functionality and his family will “determine what’s best from there”.
On the morning of April 9, 2021, DMX lost functionality in multiple essential organs and was pronounced dead shortly after at age 50. It was revealed on July 8 by the Westchester County Medical Examiner’s Office that Simmons’ official cause of death was a cocaine-induced heart attack
DMX died on April 9, 2021, following a cocaine-induced heart attack.
