Note: This article contains descriptions of alleged domestic violence that some readers may find disturbing.
On October 8, 2016, 18-year-old Jahseh Onfroy was arrested in his native Florida and charged with four felonies: aggravated battery of a pregnant woman, domestic battery by strangulation, false imprisonment, and witness tampering. In published interviews and in phone calls posted on social media, the rapper and singer known as XXXTentacion maintained that his ex-girlfriend Geneva Ayala, the woman who was allegedly attacked, was jumped by someone else and was not pregnant. XXXTentacion was about to become one of the fastest-rising stars of the streaming and social-media era, the tattooed face of an emotionally raw, genre-fluid movement known as SoundCloud rap. For the time being, he was in jail.
As XXXTentacion awaited trial on two previous felony charges, home invasion robbery and aggravated battery with a firearm, an audience clamored to hear more from him. In early 2017, the music publication The FADER started working on an XXXTentacion documentary, according to the company’s then-creative director, Robert Semmer (now head of video for a publication owned by Condé Nast, which also owns Pitchfork), Scott Perry, then a senior producer at FADER, and others close to the project. From the beginning, according to those sources, the documentary was intended to be a reported piece of journalism. “I was interested in deeper storytelling,” says Semmer.
That documentary, however, has not yet been released. As described, the footage, from March and April 2017, may have offered a unique snapshot of an artist breaking into stardom—XXXTentacion was on the verge of a charting debut album, several charting songs, and acclaim from music icons like Kendrick Lamar and Erykah Badu. Only one year later, in March 2018, XXXTentacion’s second album, ?, entered the Billboard 200 albums chart at No. 1. And, when he was alive, for all the public outcry over the allegations against him, record executives apparently knew a revenue opportunity when they saw one. XXXTentacion signed a reported $10 million record deal. Then, on June 18, 2018, at age 20, he was shot dead.
His music further skyrocketed commercially, surpassing a streaming milestone set by Taylor Swift and notching a posthumous No. 1 album last December with Skins, which featured a guest verse from Kanye West. According to Spotify, XXXTentacion was one of America’s top five most streamed male artists of 2019. Semmer’s film had the potential to be the definitive document of XXXTentacion in a pivotal moment in his life.
Telling the story of a figure like XXXTentacion is undoubtedly difficult. His and Ayala’s relationship was highly visible on social media, but there are also mountains of public records to sift through. Over the past couple of years, Pitchfork has gradually obtained more than 50 hours of XXXTentacion’s jail phone calls, and only last month received previously unreported statements in which XXXTentacion appears to acknowledge, in contrast to his denials, that Ayala was pregnant with his child. To set out to make an authoritative, journalistic documentary about XXXTentacion could be a herculean feat that would perhaps involve hours of interviews, legal consultation, and editorial nuance.
Semmer says he initially wanted his documentary to explore the question, “Can you separate art from the artist?” In late March 2017, XXXTentacion pleaded no contest to the older charges and was sentenced to probation. According to Semmer and others close to the project, after weeks of coordinating with XXXTentacion’s team, FADER was on hand in Florida to shoot his release from jail. They also shot original footage of the rapper with his family and visiting a mall, and the chaotic scene at XXXTentacion’s first big post-release show in Miami. Other never-before-seen footage also included separate interviews with XXXTentacion and Ayala.
An interview with Ayala, if released in mid-2017, could perhaps have been groundbreaking. Ayala previously described the allegations against XXXTentacion in a January 2017 deposition, but the first news report on the grim details did not appear until September 2017. The first public interview with Ayala didn’t appear until June 2018, as part of a Miami New Times feature. (Pitchfork’s attempts to reach Ayala have been unsuccessful. The operator of an unverified Instagram account associated with Ayala declined to comment.)
Semmer says that during a nearly two-hour interview at a Miami recording studio on April 6, XXXTentacion discussed a difficult upbringing, his relationship with Ayala, and his lofty career ambitions, denying the allegations against him. Ayala, in a roughly one-hour interview, also discussed their relationship, details of the allegations, and verbal abuse she claimed she received online from XXXTentacion’s fans, Semmer and another person close to the project say. Afterward, in the editing process, Semmer found various clips from social media, some potentially disturbing, that showed XXXTentacion’s life and relationship with Ayala. He says the final edit ended up being primarily about their relationship.
A screening of the in-progress documentary at FADER’s New York office in mid-2017 drew a mixed reception among editorial staff, with some raising concerns about how the abuse allegations were presented, according to several people who attended. Semmer says the documentary was about 20 minutes long at that point, “presenting both sides of the story and allowing people to make their own conclusion.” Amos Barshad, a then-FADER staff writer who has contributed to Pitchfork, says, “My personal feeling was that even though this was a well-intentioned attempt at approaching this very, very sensitive topic, it was unavoidable that you’re making him a sympathetic character, and I assumed that people did not feel comfortable making him a sympathetic character.” Semmer says he made changes to the documentary as a result of the editorial staff’s feedback.
When the documentary was close to being released, Semmer says, he followed through on a promise he’d made XXXTentacion’s team from the start and gave them a courtesy look at the final result. “It was important to me, I had nothing to hide, and I wanted to uphold my end of the bargain,” he says. According to Semmer, XXXTentacion’s team demanded he cut Ayala out of the documentary, but he refused. Shortly thereafter, on July 12, 2017, two of XXXTentacion’s associates arrived at FADER’s Manhattan office building and confronted Semmer in the first floor lobby, he says. “No punches were thrown, but it was a whole thing,” says Perry, who was present at the time. Another former employee also remembers being told about the altercation. The documentary was shelved following legal threats against FADER from XXXTentacion’s camp, according to Semmer, Perry, and others close to the project.
After XXXTentacion’s death in June 2018, the project reemerged. When Kanye West visited FADER’s offices in September 2018, the understanding among the staff was that he was invited to be shown the XXXTentacion documentary, according to several people who worked at FADER at the time. (A spokesperson for West declined to comment for this article.) Around this time, Semmer, Perry, and others close to the project say they were told that XXXTentacion’s estate had become involved in the documentary.
On the one-year anniversary of XXXTentacion’s death, June 18, 2019, his estate unveiled the trailer for what a press release described as an “upcoming documentary, releasing soon.” The video shows XXXTentacion getting out of jail, being approached by fans at a mall, and standing outside at night in a street packed with fans, as well as sitting down for an interview. “This is the story, this is the full story, and this is the last time I’ma tell it,” he says into the camera. Semmer, Perry, and other sources close to the project say that when the trailer was released, they recognized its footage. “I don’t think there’s one shot in that trailer that’s not from my documentary,” says Semmer, “but it’s repurposed and re-edited in a different way. It’s not what I intended.” Ayala, XXXTentacion’s ex-girlfriend, does not appear in the trailer.
The precise contents of any XXXTentacion documentary by FADER remain unclear; the publication has gone through several changes in leadership during the course of the project and in the past month parted ways with its head of content and president/publisher. Asked to comment on this story, a FADER spokesperson gave the following statement: “The FADER takes a journalistic approach to all projects—striving to include all voices and perspectives in our storytelling. This includes incorporating the feedback and ideas from our staff to create stronger, richer, more complete portraits of the subjects and topics we cover.”
Contacted by Pitchfork in early November about the documentary, a spokesperson for XXXTentacion said, “We haven’t announced the release date, I’ll keep you posted as news becomes available.” A month later, a press release about XXXTentacion’s second posthumous album, Bad Vibes Forever, released on December 6, stated, “X’s estate will continue to preserve his legacy with a documentary, set to release in 2020.” The spokesperson did not respond to further requests for comment.
The facts of XXXTentacion’s life keep surfacing, piece by piece, as his fame continues to grow. Posthumously, XXXTentacion has appeared on a Spider-Man soundtrack, shared tracks with legacy icons like Lil Wayne and blink-182, and received warm tributes from ascendant stars like Billie Eilish. All charges against XXXTentacion, including another 15 felony counts involving witness tampering, were dropped after his death, and he had always maintained his innocence. But in October 2018, Pitchfork obtained a previously unreleased recording of XXXTentacion from the state attorney’s office. A spokesperson for the office said the recording was made in secret by an acquaintance of XXXTentacion’s around the time of his arrest two years earlier. On the tape, the rapper discusses abusing his former girlfriend and takes responsibility for a stabbing incident in Florida.
Miami-Dade prosecutors also entered into evidence more than 50 hours of jail calls XXXTentacion made after his arrest. (His own defense lawyer told Pitchfork in February 2018 that the calls were mostly “contradictory in nature and content.”) The recordings include a call from October 15, 2016—newly obtained by Pitchfork—in which XXXTentacion tells a woman he addresses as Geneva, “I owe you my world.” He says to her, “What’s going on with you and just the fact that your eye is messed up, I’m going to make all of that shit up to you, bruh.... You’re my first baby moms, bruh. I’m sad that you had a miscarriage, and I wasn’t even there to support.... I can give you the 3,000 if you want to drop the charges.”
After she hangs up, he can be heard on the recording telling a third person on the call, “Don’t worry, bruh, I don’t want nothing to do with that girl, bruh. I’m just trying to butter her up so that way I can get these fucking charges [dropped].” When the person reminds him that he should be careful while speaking on the jail phone, XXXTentacion says, “I ain’t put no hands on that girl, bruh.” With that, his allotted call time is up and the tape goes silent.
Additional reporting by Anna Gaca.
If you or someone you know has been affected by domestic violence and need to talk, we recommend this resource:
The National Domestic Violence Hotline
1-800-799-SAFE (7233)
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