The 2017 project Juice WRLD’s mother thought was demonic
Juice WRLD’s first EP, JuiceWrld 9 9 9, is what launched his career and revealed him to be one of the most exciting talents of his generation. But his very own mother was deeply disturbed by the work.
Juice WRLD first released the EP himself, uploading it to SoundCloud during the summer of 2017. It proved so successful that he ended up securing a label-backed release for it the following year, coming out in March 2018 via Grade A Productions and Interscope Records.
The EP produced the single ‘Lucid Dreams,’ which was key to driving Juice’s success. In 2022 the song was certified Diamond by the RIAA, which meant it had sold more than 10 million units in the United States. That no longer means literal sales, but also takes into account streaming data. Either way, it has proven to be an enduringly popular song.
But, as Juice WRLD revealed during an interview with Elevator in 2018, his mother “flipped” when she first learned of his EP. She believed it to be a “demonic” work, although Juice insisted that “it’s pretty much the opposite of that.”
Juice’s mother was a very religious woman, and she prevented him from listening to hip-hop while he was growing up. What he was allowed to listen to was rock and pop, which led him to develop a taste for the likes of Blink-182, Black Sabbath and Fall Out Boy. These influences later shaped his rap career anyway.
Despite her strictness, Juice’s mother inadvertently helped her son’s future music career in another way. She encouraged his piano-playing from a young age, which later led him to take up guitar, drums and trumpet. He was a musical kid, and his mother encouraged him.
But she had a problem with rap, and, even after he had started to demonstrate a talent for it, she still had her reservations. She was uncomfortable with what she perceived to be the demonic connotations of his first EP.
“I was going through a lot of shit,” Juice said of his process behind 9 9 9, “and I wanted to take the hell that I’m in and turn it upside down.”
Juice poured a lot of darkness into that first EP, but not in a way that sought to evoke demonic associations. He considered the work to be a sort of therapy session, with which he could work through his issues. Sadly, of course, he would soon succumb to his problems. He died from taking in toxic levels of oxycodone and codeine in 2019, aged just 21.