I was seven in 1995 when I first heard “Space Age Pimpin’.” The bassline and raw rhymes of 8Ball & MJG had me and you, yo mama and yo cousin too all wanting to seduce a beautiful woman like Adina Howard, and drive her around on gold Daytons through my hometown of Clarksville, Tennessee. Day in and day out, I would nod my head to the beat, rapping the duo’s lyrics while playing Mortal Kombat.¹

That same year, at the Source Awards, OutKast’s André 3000 and Big Boi were pummeled with boos after they won Best New Artist for their album, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik. They were unapologetically taking southern slang and street stories and infusing them with new flavors that no one could dismiss as “backward” or “behind.” At a time when hip-hop was dominated by tension between East Coast and West Coast artists, OutKast’s eclectic, Afro-futuristic style captured my attention. OutKast stood on stage boldly proclaiming “The South got something to say,” and their music proved that the South was just as innovative, creative, and complex as any other part of the country.²

For young Black boys in the hood, southern rap, through its explicit storytelling of struggle, self-discovery, survival, and success, is a vital cultural lens for exploring masculinity and identity. OutKast inspired my imagination, but the creative fantasies of my youth were extinguished after my mother’s addiction to crack cocaine left us broke and without running water or electricity. With no mentors or other parental figures to guide me and my older brother, Robert, rap was our father figure. I started calling myself “Soulja C” because I realized that if I wanted to survive my chaotic environment, I had no choice but to be “Bout It, Bout It” and become a soldier on the front lines. With the wrapper from Rolo chocolates covering my teeth, giving me a fake gold grill, I would walk the railroad tracks separating our hood from the rest of the city with my friends and rap No Limit songs, word for word.³

I felt comforted by TRU soldiers like Mac and C-Murder who could “Feel My Pain,” but my anger only grew when Robert and I had to be adopted. Even though I was mad at Mama for how we were living, I didn’t want to live with anyone else. The absence of my mother fueled the flames that were burning my tiny heart. The fire was contained by the sounds of artists like Playa Fly, who taught me to tuck my feelings in my pocket and embrace the fallacious mantra: “Nobody Needs Nobody.” As my brother and I endured suffocating poverty, southern hip-hop gave us air to breathe and a sense of familiarity in a world where familial support was absent. In our hood, we didn’t have many safety nets, but we had music.⁴

Everything shifted when I was ten and my cousin, Cudas, was murdered. Watching paramedics lift his lifeless body made me feel like my childhood died with him. I accepted that UGK was right, “One Day” you’re here and then the next day you’re gone. I didn’t know how to process the grief. I turned to fighting and skipping school. Songs like Master P’s “I Miss My Homies” were the only place I found permission to inwardly grieve, but then it was back to survival mode with no safe space for a young Black boy to cry.⁵

No Christmas presents, no birthday cakes, a broken front tooth. I was miserable. My mother was slipping further into addiction. It was hard to smile about anything, but despite it all, Project Pat helped me to feel like the “Life We Live” was still beautiful. I tried to get a regular job, but there weren’t any opportunities available for an eleven-year-old. So I started shooting dice and selling weed just to have enough money to eat and buy necessities like clothes and shoes.⁶

Then the Hot Boys started teaching me that if I saved enough money, I could have “Bling Bling,” which would make everyone “Respect My Mind.” Around fourteen, I started selling crack like my friends, and the money was as intoxicating for me as the drugs were for the fiends. When I started making a name for myself in the dope game, Robert noticed that I was moving too fast, so he tried to slow me down before I ended up chopped and screwed like a DJ Screw and Swishahouse song. He gave me an ultimatum: Either fight him every time he catches me on the block or post up with him at his spot so he could keep his eye on me. But my brother could not stop the speeding train he was riding on himself. He didn’t know he had sold drugs to a confidential informant. The police raided the house only a few months after I started hustling with him.⁷

Because Robert was eighteen and his name was on the search warrant, he took all the charges for the drugs they found, even though they were all mine. Robert was waiting to re-up that day, and the only thing illegal he had in the house were his guns, which were a misdemeanor offense. I clung to the misguided belief that without money, I ain’t shit. So I brushed off my brother’s arrest as just another chapter in our ongoing saga of Ghetto Stories, and I kept hustling. T. I.’s hit album, Trap Muzik, captured the reality I was living every day. He rapped stories of poverty and pride, of joy and hustle, reflecting a way of life that few outside the streets can fully understand. I got a taste of being the “Rubber Band Man,” saving ten thousand dollars by my sixteenth birthday, and accumulating a wardrobe full of throwback jerseys and Jordans. I felt like “I Can’t Quit,” I had to keep “Doin’ My Job,” so daily I would turn on music and focus on trapping.⁸

Between the police and gangbanging, I knew that any moment could be my last. By now, the dope game was no longer a game, and southern rap doesn’t shy away from showing the destructive side of our world. I would ride and listen to fellow Tennessean Yo Gotti rap about the toll that street life takes on our families, the temptations that pull us in, and the ways we’d sometimes lose ourselves to it. In his songs about survival, I heard the underlying message of strength, telling me, “I see you. I get it.”

By the summer of 2006, Jeezy had given me so much Thug Motivation 101 that I believed I could sell my way from poverty to wealth. Even though I had the “Streets On Lock,” I wanted more for myself. I never wanted to grow up and sell drugs, it was just the only way I knew to survive. But I also knew there had to be more to life than the streets. I would listen to Jeezy’s “Dreamin’,” my heart yearning for all the things money couldn’t buy, like my mama being free from addiction and my brother free of depression. But not all dreams come true.⁹

On January 1, 2007, my brother, Robert, took his own life. He was twenty-one years old. Finding his lifeless body took a piece of my heart. I had to learn the hard way that, like T. I. said, “life’s ups and downs, they come and go.” All I could do with the pain was cry nonstop and pray that my brother’s soul would live on in the sky, just like T. I. and Jamie Foxx’s song told me it would. I was in extreme pain, hurting from the depths of my heart, feeling responsible, and feeling alone. My brother was everything to me. We had been through so much, more than any children should ever have to endure. And now he was gone. I didn’t know how to process grief. The only coping mechanisms I’d ever known were music, weed, and money. So I turned the music up, fired a blunt up, and dove deeper into the streets, filling my pockets up. The reckless lifestyle I was living was costing me thousands of dollars monthly. From arrests to lawyer fees, I was taking loss after loss. Even though prison and death were a constant threat, I was “Ready for Whatever.”¹⁰

When 2007 turned into 2010, my brother had been “Dead and Gone” for three years, and now I had eight years of probation to serve for drug cases I caught after he died. The pain that I had been feeling since childhood never ceased and the wounds never healed. I started going to the studio more, hoping to bring my own dreams of becoming a rapper to fruition as I confronted my brother’s death through music. I felt a release anytime I was in the booth, channeling my pain and anger into my rap. An indescribable feeling would come over me as I imagined making it big, walking out onto a stage before thousands, and letting them see inside my shredded heart while I spit lyrics about escaping the hardships of the hood. My homeboy’s rap career had started getting some buzz, making success feel within reach for me too. With a pocket full of money, several cars on chrome, and my homeboy’s songs getting radio and club play, I felt “On Top of the World.” I was convinced that if I “Make the Trap Say Aye,” like OJ da Juiceman, until I make it rapping, everything would be okay.¹¹

Boy, was I a fool.

Just as quickly as hope set in, reality slapped me in the face. As Jeezy warned me in “Soul Survivor,” “them alphabet boys got us under surveillance.” DEA agents arrested me on December 10, 2010, marking the beginning of a “Long Journey,” like Boosie articulated on his album Incarcerated. At just twenty-two, I was picked up on federal drug conspiracy charges. Plies tried to warn me on his album, The Real Testament, that hustling and gangbanging could get me “100 Years.” Damn. Sitting in the federal holding facility, I found solace in J. Cole’s observations, delivered through double and triple entendres. Cole confirmed that I wasn’t crazy, that I wasn’t alone, and that someone else was seeing what I was seeing: that the hood was created intentionally through systemic oppression, and sadly, I wasn’t just trappin’—I had fallen into their trap.¹²

Like Mr. Bigg, I exercised my constitutional right and “took that shit to trial.” But I didn’t prevail, and on August 26, 2013, I was found guilty. I knew, due to federal drug laws, I faced a mandatory minimum, and the judge would have no choice but to sentence me to two life sentences because of two prior drug convictions as a teenager. After my conviction, I curled up on the bunk in my cell, yearning to be free, feeling like a “Lonely Child,” as YoungBoy Never Broke Again rapped. I couldn’t wrap my mind around the fact that I was going to spend the rest of my natural life in federal prison. But southern rap held me. The artists’ souls came through their lyrics and the beat, connecting to my soul, empowering my soul, and helping me endure this new reality.¹³

Refusing to be broken, I harnessed my power of choice and read every book I could get my hands on and dedicated myself to rigorous academic study. I knew I was getting a mandatory life sentence, but I also knew the power of my memory, which I had been honing all my life by memorizing the lyrics of my favorite rap songs. I made a plan to utilize all the knowledge and information I’d been consuming from countless books and encyclopedias.

I stepped into the courtroom for my sentencing hearing and delivered a forty-five-minute allocution. If society was going to throw me away like garbage and act like my life didn’t matter, I wanted everyone in the courtroom to hear and feel that I was much more. I memorized what I was going to say in a perfect rhythm—just as I had memorized rap songs from my favorite artists. I told Judge Kevin Sharp and everyone in the courtroom, that like Young Dolph, I too, was “born in the ’80s, crack baby,” and if I ever got a chance to be released, I would leave a positive imprint on the world. I told the judge about my rough upbringing, I spoke on everything from little-known American history, philosophy, different fields of science, and economics, showing them my intellectual depth. Inspired by Big K.R.I.T.’s rise into the national spotlight with his mixtape K.R.I.T. Wuz Here, I wanted to leave a mark in what could be my last public declaration. I stood tall in the courtroom, feet shackled, and delivered my freedom speech. Then came the inevitable: Judge Sharp sentenced me to life in prison without the possibility of parole.¹⁴

As I started serving a life sentence in 2014, music continued to be a lifeline for me. In federal prison, they allowed us to buy a small MP3 player for one hundred dollars. Songs cost about two dollars each and had to be the clean version. We made it work. Every day, I’d slip in my earbuds and travel into the world of southern hip-hop. During rec time, you could hear guys freestyling over southern rap beats. Migos’s “Bad and Boujee” became an unexpected source of levity with the infectious “raindrop, drop top” hook that would have us feeling like we were in the free world. The guys in prison would debate one rapper’s flow against another’s wordplay. We would analyze Lil Wayne’s metaphors, Rick Ross’s braggadocious claims, and Future’s psychedelic conjuring.¹⁵

Rich Homie Quan and Young Thug’s “Lifestyle” transported me to a party on a yacht, far from my prison cell. Gunna and Lil Baby’s “Drip Too Hard” made my khaki uniform feel like it was from the latest collection of a designer brand. Killer Mike’s “Reagan” became a favorite, its biting critique of systemic injustice resonating with my own experiences. I found solace in “4 Your Eyez Only.” J. Cole’s introspective flow helped me process my past, while I envisioned a future beyond the walls, a narrative of redemption and legacy.¹⁶

Southern rap was an anchor, a connection to the outside world, and a reminder of the culture I longed to return home to. These artists didn’t romanticize the South or shy away from its hard truths. As true cultural storytellers, they painted a vivid picture of a place that is both beautiful and bruised, a place we love deeply but struggle to survive in. Their music offered no filter, no gloss, just the raw truth that reflected our shared experiences. It reminded me that I wasn’t alone in my struggles, my joy, my loss, and my hope.

In 2017, I read a news article that told me Judge Kevin Sharp was resigning in protest of my mandatory life sentence, and he was advocating for my release. YFN Lucci’s “Hard Times” sang to me as I kneeled in prayer, in gratitude. Things kept shifting in my favor. A brilliant Black attorney named Brittany K. Barnett learned about my case from the media attention Judge Sharp garnered and agreed to help me pro bono. She worked tirelessly, winning a rare argument that secured me a sentence reduction from life to fourteen years. With earned good time, I had only two years left to serve. But Brittany didn’t stop there. She enlisted the help of a global superstar and, along with former judge Kevin Sharp, went to the White House seeking executive clemency for me.¹⁷

On January 20, 2021, after surviving more than ten years in federal prison, I walked out of the United States Penitentiary in Beaumont, Texas, a free man. As I took my first steps of freedom, the first two songs I listened to were Boosie’s “True Soldier” and Plies’s “Gotta Be.” I was extremely happy to be free, but as the prison faded in the rearview, I shed tears for the brothers I had left behind, stuck inside a living hell. Camaraderie, love, and loyalty have always been the pillars of southern rap, and rap sustained me through my darkest days.¹⁸

I’m blessed that I didn’t have to die in prison, as was expected by the life sentence I was serving. Now, I’m a junior at Southern Methodist University in Dallas and a soon-to-be-published author, with my memoir forthcoming from Little, Brown. My mother is now sober and living a good life. Kevin Gates said it best: We are choosing to vibrate high, and “I Don’t Apologize” for our positive changes and our smiles. I’m forever grateful for southern rap, which empathized with me, educated me, and loved me when I felt like nobody else did.¹⁹

Southern rap morphed Chris Young into Soulja C, training me to survive the war on drugs and the war on poverty. I find joy in inspiring and motivating others, just like southern hip-hop has done for me throughout my life. It was my anthem as I persevered. Hip-hop, a progeny of the spiritual hymns our ancestors sang as they picked cotton, chopped tobacco, harvested indigo and rice, and crushed and boiled sugar cane on the plantations of the Deep South, has always reverberated with pain and hope. On days when I feel like I’m not doing enough or I’m not as far in life as I want to be, I remember how far I’ve come with my ancestors by my side. And like Rod Wave, I remind myself, I “Already Won.”²⁰

I owe southern artists for teaching me how to challenge stereotypes and embrace the complexities of my journey. Southern rap serves as a powerful reminder that our stories matter, and, through music, we find the strength to write our own narratives and inspire others to get free along the way. Now, like OutKast once declared to the world, I’m standing tall, yelling, “The South got something to say.”

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Chris Young is a visionary public speaker, author, and entrepreneur whose life’s work addresses the intersection of poverty, policy, and technology. He is currently pursuing a degree in public policy with a minor in economics at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, and his forthcoming memoir is to be published by Little, Brown and Company.

Header image: Young Chris (center) with some musical heroes.

IMAGE SOURCES:

Art 1: Young Chris, courtesy of the author; gold leaf halo, canva.com; green plant, canva.com; black Cadillac ATS with black rims, by Talia, unsplash.com; Big Boi at Rock’n’Heim Rock Festival, August 15, 2014, by Sven Mandel, Wikimedia Commons; Rick Ross performing live, Key Biscayne, Florida, April 1, 2020, by Brian Lundquist, unsplash.com; André 3000, October 11, 2003, by Tulane Public Relations, Wikimedia Commons; J. Cole, January 4, 2021, by Leo_Visions, unsplash.com; 2 Chainz, Atlanta, Georgia, March 30, 2019, by Josh Gordon, unsplash.com.

Art 2: Chris and Robert, courtesy of the author; gold frame, canva.com; green plant, canva.com; white crown, canva.com; close-up shot of paper kite butterfly perching on red flowers, by Pixabay, pexels.com; orange butterfly, canva.com.

Art 3: Chris, with former judge Kevin Sharp and attorney Brittany K. Barnett, courtesy of the author; sunflowers, canva.com; gold leaf halo, canva.com; blue sky with clouds, June 5, 2020, by Chandan Chaurasia, unsplash.com; light echoes from red supergiant star V838 Monocerotis, October 2004, by NASA, ESA, and H. E. Bond, unsplash.com.

NOTES:

1. 8Ball & MJG, “Space Age Pimpin’,” On Top of the World, Suave House Records/Relativity Records, 1995.
2. OutKast, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik, Arista Records/LaFace Records, 1994.
3. Master P and Mia X, “Bout It, Bout It II,” Ice Cream Man, No Limit Records/Priority Records, 1996.
4. C-Murder, “Feel My Pain,” Life or Death, No Limit Records/Priority Records, 1998; Playa Fly, “Nobody Needs Nobody,” Movin’ On, Super Sigg Records, 1998.
5. UGK, “One Day,” Ridin’ Dirty, Jive Records, 1996; Master P, Pimp C, and Silkk The Shocker, “I Miss My Homies,” Ghetto D, No Limit Records/Priority Records, 1997.
6. Project Pat, Namond Lumpkin, and Edgar Fletcher, “Life We Live,” Mista Don’t Play: Everythangs Workin, Hypnotize Minds Productions/Loud Records/RED MUSIC, 2001.
7. B. G., “Bling Bling,” Chopper City in the Ghetto, Cash Money Records/Universal Records, 1999; Hot Boys, “Respect My Mind,” Guerrilla Warfare, Cash Money Records/Universal Records, July 27, 1999.
8. Lil Boosie and Webbie, “Ghetto Stories,” Ghetto Stories, Trill Entertainment, 2003; T. I., TrapMuzik, Grand Hustle Records/Atlantic Records, 2003; T. I., “Rubber Band Man,” Trap Muzik; T. I., “I Can’t Quit,” Trap Muzik; T. I., “Doin’ My Job,” Trap Muzik.
9. Young Jeezy, Let’s Get It: Thug Motivation 101; Young Jeezy, “Streets On Lock,” The Inspiration, Corporate Thugz Entertainment/Def Jam Recordings, 2006; Young Jeezy and Keyshia Cole, “Dreamin’,” The Inspiration.
10. T. I. and Jamie Foxx, “Live in the Sky,” King, Grand Hustle Records/Atlantic Records, 2006; T. I., “Ready for Whatever,” Paper Trail, Grand Hustle Records/Atlantic Records, 2008.
11. T. I. and Justin Timberlake, “Dead and Gone,” Paper Trail; T. I., B. o. B., and Ludacris, “On Top of the World,” Paper Trail; OJ da Juiceman and Gucci Mane, “Make Tha Trap Say Aye,” The Otha Side of the Trap, 32 Entertainment/Asylum Records, 2009.
12. Jeezy, “Soul Survivor,” Thug Motivation 101; Lil Boosie, “Long Journey,” Incarcerated, Trill Entertainment/Asylum Records, 2010; Plies, “100 Years,” The Real Testament, Atlantic Records/Slip-N-Slide Records, 2007.
13. The Last Mr. Bigg, “Trial Time,” Only If U Knew, Warlock Records, 2000; YoungBoy Never Broke Again, “Lonely Child,” AI YoungBoy 2, Never Broke Again/Atlantic Records, 2019.
14. Young Dolph, “Preach,” High Class Street Music 4: American Gangster, Paper Route Empire, 2014; Big K.R.I.T., K.R.I.T. Wuz Here, Cinematic/Nature Sounds, May 4, 2010.
15. Migos, “Bad and Boujee,” Culture, Quality Control Music/300 Entertainment/Atlantic Records, 2017.
16. Rich Gang, Rich Homie Quan, and Young Thug, “Lifestyle,” produced by London on da Track, Cash Money Records/Republic Records, 2014; Gunna and Lil Baby, “Drip Too Hard,” Drip Harder, YSL Records/Quality Control Music/Motown/Capitol Records, 2018; Killer Mike, “Reagan,” R.A.P. Music, Williams Street Records, 2012; J. Cole, 4 Your Eyez Only, Dreamville Records/Roc Nation/Interscope Records, 2016.
17. YFN Lucci, “Hard Times,” Ray Ray from Summerhill, Think It’s A Game Entertainment, 2018.
18. Lil Boosie, Webbie, and Foxx, “True Soldier,” Trill Entertainment, ca. 2005; Plies, “Gotta Be,” Da REAList, Big Gates Records/Slip-N-Slide Records/Atlantic Records, 2008.
19. Kevin Gates, “I Don’t Apologize,” The Ceremony, Atlantic Records/Bread Winners’ Alumni, 2024.
20. Rod Wave and Lil Durk, “Already Won,” SoulFly, Alamo Records/Geffen Records/Interscope Records, 2021.