If Jean Michel-Basquiat poured his pain onto the literal canvas of the masterpieces that he created (and sometimes destroyed) during his brief career, DMX turned his personal battles with alcohol and substance abuse into music that explicitly grappled with addiction, self-medication, depression, anger and grief. In doing so, he powerfully showcased Black male vulnerability in an industry that too often relied on a one dimensional view of masculinity to sell records and project subjective notions of authenticity. And his humor, dark and subversive, shone through his frank talk about sex, drugs and violence.
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