Within one week of the albums release, 670,000 units were shipped.

He began rapping in the early 1990s, and released his debut album Its Dark and Hell Is Hot in 1998, to both critical acclaim and commercial success, selling 251,000 copies within its first week of release.

And Then There Was X, in 1999, which included the hit single Party Up (Up in Here).

In 2006, he starred in the reality television series DMX: Soul of a Man, which was primarily aired on the BET cable television network.

In 2003, DMX published a book of his memoirs entitled, E.A.R.L.: The Autobiography of DMX.

Earl was the second child of Arnett, who had given birth to a daughter, Bonita, two years prior, as well as one daughter, Shayla, and two stillborn sons after Earl.

Barker did not want Simmons to keep her son, and cut off almost all contact with the family as soon as Earl was born.

As a child, Simmons suffered greatly from bronchial asthma, being taken to the emergency room almost nightly due to him waking up unable to breathe.

Dmg Rapper Driver While Crossing

At some point in his childhood, Simmons was hit by a drunk driver while crossing the street and suffered minor injuries.

He claims his family could have received as much as 10,000 in a legal settlement, but his mother refused to open a case as she claimed it went against her faith.

When Simmons was 5 years old, his family settled in Yonkers, New York.

When he was 14, Simmons began wandering the streets of Yonkers to escape his mothers abuse, and eventually found comfort in befriending stray dogs that walked the streets at night.

Shortly after he began doing this, his mother once again sent him to a boys home.

During his stay at the boys home, Simmons bonded with other students from New York over their shared love of hip-hop music, and after performing for his friends, they encouraged Simmons to continue writing music to the behest of his teacher.

When he returned home, Simmons met Ready Ron, a local rapper, who, impressed with Simmons beatboxing skills, asked him to become his partner.

Simmons chose the name DMX, which came from an instrument he had used at the boys home, the Oberheim DMX drum machine; it later was also interpreted as Dark Man X.

After serving time in prison, he began writing his own lyrics and would perform at the local rec center for younger children.

Dmg Rapper Free Time To

After going to prison again in 1988, he began taking rapping more seriously, dedicating almost all of his free time to writing lyrics and also meeting and rapping with K-Solo while incarcerated.

When he was released that summer, he began producing and selling his own mixtapes where he would rap over instrumentals from other songs and sell them on street corners, which helped him build a local fan base all over New York.

In 1991, Gabriel Grevenstuk from The Source magazine praised DMX in his Unsigned Hype column that highlighted unsigned hip-hop artists.

The same year, he recorded his first demos, Unstoppable Force and Three Little Pigs.

The single did not receive much airplay, citation needed and the label eventually agreed to release DMX from their contract.

His first major-label album, Its Dark and Hell Is Hot, which included the single Ruff Ryders Anthem, was released in May 1998.

The album debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 chart in the U.S and sold over five million copies.

It debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, where it remained for three consecutive weeks.