Chance the Rapper Says He ‘Would Have Died’ From Drug Use

Chance the Rapper “probably would have died” if he had kept using drugs the way he did following the release of Acid Rap. The rapper, 30, recently opened up to Complex in honor of the 10-year anniversary of his breakout mixtape, looking back on how his drug use at the time made him a “different person” and a “lesser person” than he is today.

“The way that I was living at that time. I had everything in excess,” he told the outlet. “Right after I dropped the project, I went on a few tours where I really didn’t make any money. Then I went on my first tour, my headlining tour, where I made some money.” Chance remembered, “I went and rented a crib. This is my first time living outside of my parents’ house in another city and having money and doing a lot of drugs. A lot, a lot, a lot of drugs.”

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Chance The Rapper reflects on how he’s changed since the beginning of his career chancetherapper @chancetherapper

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Chance knows that if he had not changed his ways, he wouldn’t have made it to where he is today. “If I hadn’t had my spirit tugged on-literally-and a calling to become a better version of myself, then I would have died for sure,” the “Juice” artist said. “Then I would just be the representative of acid and I’m so much more.”

The Grammy Award-winner has been open about his mental health over the years, telling Taraji P. Henson in October 2021 that he had made it through “a lot of dark days” in his past during an episode of Peace of Mind with Taraji. “There’s probably a ton of situations where people you know, we just wrote them off as crazy, or like they was tweakin’ but they were actually going through a chronic mental health disorder,” Chance said of his awareness of mental health growing up. “I feel like this is something that we’re all, as a mainstream, we’re starting to be like, ‘OK, yeah health is beyond just our physical.’”

“Obviously I deal with PTSD, I saw my friend killed in front of me when I was 19 and I’ve seen people I didn’t know get killed too,” he continued of his own tough times. “You become kind of numb to it, like somebody else died last week but it stays with you, you know what I mean? And you don’t realize until later – like I have lasting effects.”