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      The Telling of DMX’s Life Story

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      At the end of the 1990s, there was no rapper more popular than DMX, who rode a series of energized and earnest hits to the top of the Billboard album chart with each of his first five albums.The life he lived — from a childhood marked by abuse to an adulthood clouded by addiction — was robust, stormy and signature. He died on Friday at 50, after suffering what his family called “a catastrophic cardiac arrest” a week earlier.On this week’s Popcast, a conversation about the peaks and valleys of DMX’s career, the intense potency of his music and his religious fervor and what it was like to interview him.Guest:Smokey Fontaine, the co-author, with DMX, of the 2002 book “E.A.R.L.: The Autobiography of DMX”; a former music editor of The Source magazine; and the current editor in chief of the Apple App Store. More

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      DMX, Rapper Who Dominated Billboard Charts, Dies at 50

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      He released a string of No. 1 albums that reflected his gritty past and featured a gruff and unmistakable lyrical style.Earl Simmons, the snarling yet soulful rapper known as DMX, who had a string of No. 1 albums in the late 1990s and early 2000s but whose personal struggles eventually rivaled his lyrical prowess, died on Friday in White Plains, N.Y. He was 50.His family announced the death in a statement. He had been on life support at White Plains Hospital after suffering what his family called “a catastrophic cardiac arrest” a week earlier.“Earl was a warrior who fought till the very end,” the Simmons family said. “He loved his family with all of his heart, and we cherish the times we spent with him.”On April 2, Mr. Simmons had a heart attack at his home in White Plains. In the days that followed, his representatives said he was on life support “in a vegetative state.” Outside of the hospital, family and friends gathered with hundreds of fans, playing DMX’s music aloud and praying, holding up their arms in the shape of an X.Mr. Simmons’s music was often menacing and dark, with the occasional nod to Christian spirituality. He committed crimes, served time in different correctional institutions and battled addiction long before he released an album, and his troubled past informed the gritty content and inimitable delivery of his rhymes.He barked over the chorus of “Get at Me Dog,” the breakout single from his 1998 debut album, “It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot.”“His throat seems to hold a fuzzbox and a foghorn, and between songs he growled and barked,” Jon Pareles of The New York Times wrote of a Simmons concert performance in 2000. “In his raps, the gangsta life is a living hell, a constant test of loyalty and resolve.”He rapped with an explosive cadence on “Party Up (Up in Here),” the big hit from his 1999 album “ … And Then There Was X”; raw braggadocio on “Ruff Ryders’ Anthem,” a tribute to his record label on his 1998 debut album, “It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot”; and a more introspective, brooding delivery on “Damien,” a story about making a murderous bargain with a demonic benefactor.“Why is it every move I make turns out to be a bad one?” Mr. Simmons asks in “Damien.” “Where’s my guardian angel? Need one, wish I had one.”Mr. Simmons, who sold millions of records and was nominated for three Grammy Awards, was the first musician whose first five albums reached No. 1 on the Billboard chart. He was the standout artist on the Ruff Ryders label, often rapping over tracks by the star D.J. and producer Swizz Beatz. Rappers like Eve, Drag-On and the Lox, a group made up of Jadakiss, Styles P and Sheek Louch, also recorded on the label.Mr. Simmons was known for electrifying concert audiences. In 2000, the critic Elvis Mitchell wrote in The Times about his “remarkable and combative stage presence” in the concert documentary “Backstage,” which followed him and rappers like Jay-Z and Redman on the 1999 “Hard Knock Life” tour.“Bombastic and hot-blooded, he holds court in a singular fashion, exercising sheer force of will to pull the spotlight down on himself and demanding the crowd’s attention,” Mr. Mitchell wrote.Mr. Simmons starred with the rappers Nas and Method Man in Hype Williams’s 1998 gangster film, “Belly”; appeared in the 2000 action movie “Romeo Must Die” with Jet Li and the R&B singer Aaliyah; and starred with Steven Seagal in the 2001 action film “Exit Wounds.” The BET cable channel provided a closer look at his personal life with the 2006 reality series “DMX: Soul of a Man.”The macho, streetwise persona Mr. Simmons projected in his music was reinforced by repeated arrests on charges including fraud, assault, weapons possession, narcotics possession and driving under the influence.He served jail time after pleading guilty in 2008 to animal cruelty, drug possession and theft; in 2018 he was sentenced to a year in prison for tax evasion.He released several more albums over the years, including “Grand Champ” (2003) and “Undisputed” (2012). But with his frequent run-ins with the law, he never regained the success of his earlier days.DMX performing in New York in 2012. His long struggle with drugs, the bleak circumstances of his childhood and their impact on his life informed his music.Chad Batka for The New York TimesBorn in Mount Vernon, N.Y., on Dec. 18, 1970, Earl Simmons was the first and only child of Arnett Simmons and Joe Barker. He grew up in Yonkers, a city just north of the Bronx that became a hotbed of racial tension in the 1980s.His father was an itinerant artist whom he rarely saw, and his mother struggled to raise him and his half sister Bonita in a violent neighborhood. In his memoir, “E.A.R.L.: The Autobiography of DMX” (2002, with Smokey D. Fontaine), he wrote that there was often little food at home while he was growing up and that as a precocious, hot-tempered and disobedient child, he was often beaten by his mother and her lovers. (Information on his survivors was not immediately available.)Mr. Simmons turned to street crime as he grew older, spending much of his childhood and teenage years in group homes or juvenile detention facilities, where, he wrote, he sometimes faced solitary confinement. He became an adept car thief and robber, he said, often using vicious dogs to intimidate victims.“I was straight stickup,” Mr. Simmons wrote. “I’d rob three times a day: before school, after school and on the late night.”In the late 1980s he started performing as a beatboxer, creating beats using only his mouth, with a local rapper named Ready Ron. (He took the name DMX from the Oberheim DMX drum machine, a model popular in the 1980s.) He said he was 14 when Ready Ron introduced him to crack cocaine by passing him what Mr. Simmons thought was marijuana.“I later found out that he laced the blunt with crack,” Mr. Simmons told the rapper Talib Kweli in an interview last year. “Why would you do that to a child?” He became addicted to it.His long struggle with drugs, his bleak childhood and their impact on his life informed his music — he titled a 2001 album “The Great Depression” — and many of his most swaggering songs conveyed hints of lingering trauma.“All I know is pain/All I feel is rain/How can I maintain?” he raps near the start of “Ruff Ryders’ Anthem.”In 1997 he was featured, along with Method Man, Redman, Master P and Canibus, on the LL Cool J song “4, 3, 2, 1.” He was also on Mase’s “24 Hrs. to Live” and, with Lil’ Kim, the Lox’s “Money, Power, Respect.” Those high-profile guest appearances led to a contract with Def Jam, Ruff Ryders’ parent company; his first two albums came out in 1998.Before breaking through as a rap star, Mr. Simmons made a name for himself as a nasty battle rapper in the early 1990s.“I always made it personal,” he wrote in his memoir. “Nothing was too rude or vicious for me because I didn’t care.”Joe Coscarelli contributed reporting. 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      DMX Songs: Hear 10 Songs That Showed His Range

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      The gruff, evocative Yonkers rapper was a singular talent in hip-hop. He died on Friday after suffering what his family called “a catastrophic cardiac arrest” a week earlier.Earl Simmons, the gruff, evocative rapper from Yonkers, N.Y., better known as DMX, died on Friday at 50. He spent his final days on life support at White Plains Hospital in Westchester County after suffering a heart attack on April 2.DMX was one of the most recognizable M.C.s in the late 1990s and early 2000s, years when hardcore New York rap could still stake a claim as hip-hop’s central concern.Signed to Def Jam Recordings, his first five albums all debuted at No. 1, a feat no rapper has matched before or since. DMX cut a unique figure for a superstar rapper: He’d battle his inner demons using the horror-centric imagery beloved by heavy metal bands, but his albums reliably offered heartfelt, often a cappella, prayers to God. He made giant pop crossover hits, but they bubbled with wildly vivid threats better suited for a grindhouse theater. His shout-rap energy made him a favorite in the outwardly angsty era of Woodstock ’99 and the nü-metal band Korn’s Family Values Tour, but he was also a shirtless sex symbol moonlighting as an actor.Here’s a small sampling of an artist with a range that encompassed the shocking, the sincere and the simply incredible. (Listen on Spotify here.)‘Born Loser’ (1993)After years spent as a ruthless battle rapper, mixtape hustler and early beneficiary of The Source magazine’s Unsigned Hype column, DMX and the nascent Ruff Ryders label released the rarely heard “Born Loser” on a handful of 12-inch records. Soon after, “Born Loser” became the lone song released as part of DMX’s false start with Columbia Records. Both DMX and the rapper K-Solo had claimed a rhyme style where individual words in bars are spelled out. For example, on his 1990 hit “Spellbound,” K-Solo raps “I s-p-e-l-l very w-e-l-l/I only spell so all can t-e-l-l.” After the success of “Spellbound,” DMX wrote this track while fuming in a Westchester prison cell. “Born Loser” was not a hit, but as a punchline rap where DMX makes himself the punchline, it would foreshadow the self-eviscerating rhymes of rappers like Eminem and Fatlip: “They kicked me out the shelter because they said I smelled a/Little like the living dead and looked like Helter Skelter.”LL Cool J featuring Redman, Method Man, Canibus and DMX, ‘4, 3, 2, 1’ (1997)This single would be epochal for multiple reasons. It sparked the lyrical war between LL Cool J and Canibus, perhaps the last consequential wax battle held on actual vinyl — soon such things were fought in the fields of mixtapes and MP3s. And “4, 3, 2, 1” was the breakout single for DMX, then a new Def Jam signee, who holds his own against members of an elite tier of M.C.s. Here, he raps death threats with a filmmaker’s eye for detail: “Believe what I say when I tell you/Don’t make me put you somewhere where nobody can smell you.”DMX featuring Sheek Louch, ‘Get at Me Dog’ (1998)DMX recorded his debut Def Jam solo single amid the era of ’80s pop samples, big-budget videos and a general sentiment of getting “jiggy.” “I wasn’t down with all that pretty, happy-go-lucky [expletive],” DMX said in “E.A.R.L.: The Autobiography of DMX.” He added that Sean “Puffy” Combs “had the radio on lock, the clubs on fire, had people thinking that hip-hop was all about bright lights and shiny suits and smiled all the way to the bank — X, on the other hand, still lived in the dark.” “Get at Me Dog” is pure, unfiltered rhyming over a loop of the disco-funk band B.T. Express. If it sounds like a mixtape rap, that’s how it started: The beat and hook were part of a freestyle for DJ Clue. The song not only introduced DMX the solo artist, but introduced his trademark barking and growling, sounds inspired by his beloved pitbulls. The video — a black-and-white affair directed by Hype Williams — was filmed at New York’s hip-hop meeting ground the Tunnel, where Funkmaster Flex held court on Sunday nights. The song became one of the most beloved “Tunnel bangers.”‘Ruff Ryders’ Anthem’ (1998)The third single from DMX’s debut album, “It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot,” gleamed a little brighter than its predecessors. His rhymes were no less uncompromising and violent — “Had it, shoulda shot it/Now you’re dearly departed,” he raps. But the song heralded the blipping, pixelated debut of the producer Swizz Beatz, whose sound would ultimately define the next few years of the Ruff Ryders orbit: DMX, Eve, the Lox, Drag-On and Swizz Beatz’s own solo work. Swizz Beatz told Vibe it took a week to convince DMX to do the song: “He was like, ‘I don’t want those white-boy beats.’” Swizz would go on to produce Top 10 singles for Beyoncé, Lil Wayne, T.I. and Busta Rhymes, and to co-found the popular quarantine-era streaming battle Verzuz.‘Damien’ (1998)The rapper’s most famous storytelling rhyme involves him having a conversation with the devil — a play about fighting his own temptations. “At the time, X was in a really dark place as he was in and out of jail,” the producer Dame Grease told Okayplayer. “He told me he thought he was in hell, mentally, and could hear the devil speaking to him. He wanted to find a way to recreate that feeling.” Two sequels followed, including “The Omen (Damien II),” also in 1998, which featured a guest appearance from the shock-rocker Marilyn Manson, who would go on to have a notable impact on hip-hop, influencing modern goth-tinged artists like Travis Scott and Lil Uzi Vert, among others. The second sequel is “Damien III” (2001).‘Slippin’’ (1998)On this bloodletting, emotionally raw track, DMX confronts his troubled upbringing, his time in various institutions and his addictions with a sober eye. It was a personal and vulnerable look at his life and his struggles in the vein of diarist rappers like Tupac Shakur and Scarface. “X was writing ‘Slippin’’ for a while — six months, a year,” the Ruff Ryders founder Joaquin “Waah” Dean told The Fader. “He wanted this song to be impacting people’s lives.”‘Party Up (Up in Here)’ (2000)Perhaps the most indelible DMX song, “Party Up (Up in Here)” has a chantable, giddy chorus that belies the nimble, severe trash talk in the verses. (“Listen, your ass is about to be missin’/You know who gon’ find you? Some old man fishin’.”) “It’s called ‘Party Up,’ but it’s very disrespectful,” DMX told GQ, adding, “The beat is for the club, I just spit some real [expletive] to it.” The durable track has had a long life thanks to its use in movies like “Gone in 60 Seconds” and TV shows like “The Mindy Project.” Earl Simmons even has a writing credit in the era-defining musical “Hamilton” because of an interpolation used in “Meet Me Inside,” a song that details a conversation between Alexander Hamilton and George Washington.Aaliyah featuring DMX, ‘Come Back in One Piece’ (2000)The 2000 film “Romeo Must Die” was the first film for the R&B superstar Aaliyah and the second for DMX. Though they do not play love interests in the movie, they did team up for this song from the soundtrack, a tune in the mold of hip-hop-soul duets like Method Man and Mary J. Blige’s “I’ll Be There for You/You’re All I Need to Get By.” However, it is almost like DMX refuses to meet R&B halfway: He rhymes an unapologetic full-throated street narrative while Aaliyah plays a beleaguered partner who just wants him to be safe.‘Who We Be’ (2001)“Who We Be” is a plain-spoken list of ills both political and personal, delivered with the thudding fire of an AC/DC song. It was the third and final DMX song to be nominated for a Grammy, but he never ended up taking one home.‘X Gon’ Give It to Ya’ (2003)Though it was a moderate hit when released as a single from the “Cradle 2 the Grave” soundtrack in 2003, “X Gon’ Give It to Ya” has ultimately emerged as the most popular DMX song of the streaming era thanks to its use in the “Deadpool” films and on television’s “Rick and Morty.” DMX intended it for his fifth album, “Grand Champ,” but, seeing its potential, the “Cradle 2 the Grave” producer Joel Silver intervened. It was certified platinum in 2017, nearly 15 years after its release. More

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      DMX's Music Was a Profound Vessel for His Pain

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      The rapper, who died Friday, had no imitators because there was no way to falsify the life that forged him. He was a colossus, a fire-starter and a healer.Even when DMX was the most popular rapper on the planet, he was a genre of one: a gruff, motivational, agitated and poignant fire-starter. Pure vigor and pure heart. A drill sergeant and a healer.In 1998 and 1999, he released three majestic, bombastic albums: “It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot,” “Flesh of My Flesh, Blood of My Blood” and “… And Then There Was X.” Each one debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard album chart and has been certified platinum several times over. He performed at Woodstock ’99 for hundreds of thousands of people. He starred in “Belly,” the seminal 1998 hip-hop noir film. In his songs, he growled like a dog, credibly and often.And yet there were no DMX clones in his wake because there was no way to falsify the life that forged him. For DMX — who died Friday at 50 after suffering a heart attack on April 2 — hip-hop superstardom came on the heels of a devastating childhood marked by abuse, drug use, crime and other traumas. His successes felt more like catharsis than triumphalism. Even at his rowdiest and most celebrated, he was a vessel for profound pain.Especially as he got older, and his public struggles — countless arrests, stints in jail, continuing problems with drugs — threatened to overshadow his musical legacy, he never hid his hurt, never let shame overshadow his truth. The potency of his humanity was as heroic as any of his songs.From the release of his debut Def Jam single, “Get at Me Dog,” in 1998, DMX was an immediate titanic presence in hip-hop. Just as the genre was moving toward polished sheen, he preferred iron and concrete — rapping with a muscular throatiness that conveyed an excitable kind of mayhem. The staccato bursts on “Ruff Ryders’ Anthem” — an early Swizz Beatz masterpiece — matched DMX’s jabs of melancholy: “All I know is pain/All I feel is rain.”His voice was unrelentingly coarse, and in his peak era, between 1998 and 2003, he used it for one chest-puffed anthem after another: “Party Up (Up in Here),” “What’s My Name?,” “Who We Be,” “X Gon’ Give It to Ya,” “Where the Hood At?” Often, he rapped as if he were trying to win an argument, with repetitive emphasis and terse phrasing designed for maximum impact. Even when he dipped into flirtation, like on “What These Bitches Want,” he didn’t change his approach.But when he took on his own troubled past on “Slippin’,” he tempered himself just a bit, as if showing himself some grace:They put me in a situation forcing me to be a manWhen I was just learning to stand without a helping hand, damnWas it my fault, something I didTo make a father leave his first kid? At 7 doing my first bidEven though DMX’s time at the top of the genre was relatively brief, just a few ferocious years, he was never erased from its collective memory. That’s partly because the tumult of his personal life constantly landed him in the spotlight — he was arrested dozens of times, for charges including drug possession, aggravated assault, driving without a license and tax evasion. He rescued stray dogs, and tattooed a tribute to one of his dogs, Boomer, across the whole of his back, but also pleaded guilty to animal cruelty charges.But he remained a subject of sympathy: DMX was a wild man, and a broken one, too. Physically abused by his mother as a child, he spent significant stretches of time in group homes. He took to crime young, specializing in robbery. Many of the stories contained in his 2002 book, “E.A.R.L.: The Autobiography of DMX,” are matter of fact and harrowing.In a devastating interview last year, he explained that the person who first encouraged him to rap was also the one who first exposed him to crack, forever intertwining the art that was his salvation with the addiction that constantly threatened to undo him.DMX’s life became a tug of war between his musical gift and his traumas. Beginning in the mid-2000s, he began to fade from the charts. His turns on the big screen, in “Belly,” “Romeo Must Die” and “Exit Wounds,” gave way to turns on sometimes voyeuristic reality television programs like “Couples Therapy,” “Dr. Drew’s Lifechangers” and “Iyanla: Fix My Life.” His search for healing — his need for it — became central to his public narrative.DMX HAD ALREADY learned to tame arenas on the Hard Knock Life and Survival of the Illest tours by the time I first saw him live, in 2000, on the Cash Money/Ruff Ryders tour. It was as jolting as any performance I’ve ever seen — a frantic yet controlled display of raw charisma and might. Toward the end of his set, he stopped cold to offer a prayer. His body was covered in sweat, his voice was gruff, and thousands of people in the room went from boisterous to silent, sideswiped by DMX’s gospel. I saw the tour again a few weeks later — the scene was no less vivid.He’d been doing this for a while by then, startling audiences with his religious fervor. “It damn near brings me to tears every night because I get nothing but love. It’s like I’m taking them to church,” he told the Source in 1999. “I just love ’em to death. I can’t even explain it. Just seeing them look at me the way they do. I can’t help but to love them. And I’m not going to take them to the wrong place.”Every time I’ve seen DMX in the two decades since — from a tiny comeback show at S.O.B.’s in New York to an Easter Sunday convocation with Kanye West at Coachella — he did a version of the prayer, bringing a conflagration of a performance to a halt. On the surface, it seemed like a gift, a way to spread a message about mercy and hope in the unlikeliest of settings. But in those moments, he was also a supplicant laid bare — praying for us, and asking all of us to cover him in return. More

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      DMX's New Song Released Amid His Hospitalization

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      A rap/rock collaboration between DMX and Ian Paice as well as Steve Howe has been made available for purchase while the rapper continues to fight for his life in hospital.

      Apr 9, 2021

      AceShowbiz –
      DMX is on his way to enjoying a cross-over rap and rock hit as he fights for life in a New York hospital – his collaboration with Ian Paice and Steve Howe has just been released.

      “X Moves”, his rock/hip-hop hybrid that also features Parliament-Funkadelic star Bootsy Collins, dropped on Thursday (08Apr21), and Cleopatra Records boss Brian Perera, who co-produced the track, is hoping DMX gets to hear it.

      “Obviously, we are all holding our breath and praying that DMX pulls through and makes a full recovery,” he says. “As X Moves shows, he is still one of the most innovative and original hip-hop artists around. Our hearts go out to all of DMX’s family, friends and supporters.”

      [embedded content]

      The rapper was admitted to White Plains Hospital on Friday night (02Apr21) after suffering a heart attack. He is currently on life support and in a “vegetative state” while medics carry out tests on his brain.

        See also…

      Reports suggest DMX has not regained any brain function since he was hospitalised. He remains in a coma.

      “We ask that you please keep Earl/DMX and us in your thoughts, wishes, and prayers as well as respect our privacy as we face these challenges,” the rapper’s family said following his hospitalization.

      Fellow celebrities were quick to offer their support and ask fans to pray for the rapper.

      “DMX prayed over me once and I could feel his anointing. I’m praying for his full recovery,” Chance the Rapper wrote on Twitter while Ja Rule added, “Prayers up for my brother DMX.”

      “Prayers for DMX and his family,” Missy Elliott wrote, and Lil’ Kim added, “Come on X plzzzz. We need you. Prayers all the way up for you bro,” while fellow rap veteran LL Cool J tweeted, “Today is 4/3/21 – it’s only right that we celebrate the talent and genius of my brother @DMX on the 4,3,2,1 song. We Love you X get well fast.”

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      DMX, in a Coma, Is Set to Undergo Brain Function Tests

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      Fans of Earl Simmons, the rapper known as DMX, rallied outside his hospital this week, as musicians and others hoped for his recovery.The rapper DMX, in a coma and on life support four days after he was hospitalized, was set to undergo brain function tests Wednesday, his manager said, as fans, relatives and fellow musicians continued to hope for his recovery.The rapper and actor, whose real name is Earl Simmons, was hospitalized after a heart attack Friday. His former manager said over the weekend that he was in a “vegetative state.”“Everything is the same,” his current manager, Steve Rifkind, said on Wednesday. “Just waiting on the results.”Since Mr. Simmons, 50, had a heart attack in his home in White Plains, N.Y., performers like Missy Elliott, Ja Rule and LL Cool J have posted messages of support on social media. Gabrielle Union, an actress who starred with Mr. Simmons in the 2003 movie “Cradle 2 the Grave” and LeBron James, who described Mr. Simmons as one of his favorite artists, said they were praying for him.People have posted stories about their interactions with Mr. Simmons, who used his unadorned, gravelly voice to rap earnest lyrics about his personal suffering.DMX performs during the Ruff Ryders and Friends Reunion Tour Past, Present and Future at Barclays Center of Brooklyn on April 21, 2017.John Lamparski/FilmMagicOn Monday, hundreds of fans joined the rapper’s family in front of White Plains Hospital to play his music and pray for him. The crowds became so large they held up traffic at points. Vehicles that passed by, including a fire truck from the city’s fire department, honked loudly in support as the crowds cheered and chanted “DMX.”“Everybody put up your X,” said Stephanie Reed, a friend of Mr. Simmons, as she led a prayer for him. The crowd complied, crossing their arms above their heads or in front of their chest as a clip of Mr. Simmons praying boomed from the speakers.Some people sobbed, others lowered their heads, and some fans held up balloons spelling out Mr. Simmons’s stage name.Ms. Reed, 52, who organized the event, said in an interview Wednesday that she was overwhelmed by the size of the crowd. At one point, she said, she saw hospital staffers in the windows holding up their arms in an X.A friend makes an X gesture in honor of DMX during a prayer vigil for the rapper outside of White Plains Hospital on Monday in White Plains, N.Y.Mary Altaffer/Associated PressPeople attend a vigil for the rapper DMX in White Plains, N.Y.David Delgado/ReutersMs. Reed said she saw Mr. Simmons two weeks ago when he came to Atlanta, where she lives, and cooked her spaghetti and King Crab legs. Mr. Simmons is deeply spiritual and always prayed before he performed or ate, she said.“We’ve just got a lot of great, great memories,” Ms. Reed said. “He was like my brother. He called me sister.”Born in Mount Vernon, N.Y., on Dec. 18, 1970, Mr. Simmons grew up in Yonkers, just north of the Bronx.In the late 1990s, Mr. Simmons became a hip-hop powerhouse, rapping about violence and redemption in what Rolling Stone termed “the roughest and grimiest voice in hip-hop, the sound of gravel hitting the grave.”Mr. Simmons was the first musician whose first five albums reached No. 1 on the Billboard chart. He became known for electrifying audiences at concerts with hits that include “Party Up (Up in Here),” from 1999, and “X Gon’ Give It to Ya,” from 2003. He also appeared in television shows like “Third Watch” and movies including “Never Die Alone.”Over the years, Mr. Simmons faced repeated arrests. In 2008, he pleaded guilty to animal cruelty, drug possession and theft, and in 2018 he was sentenced to a year in prison for tax evasion. During the sentencing hearing, his lawyer played his music in Federal District Court in Manhattan to Judge Jed S. Rakoff.“In the court’s view Mr. Simmons is a good man, a very far from perfect man,” Judge Rakoff said.Joe Coscarelli contributed reporting. More