One can only imagine what kind of artist La Capone would have been having he been alive long enough to live out his talent. The young rapper from Chicago was a budding musician and had already built a formidable social media fan base before his death.
Capone is known for the few singles he released online, although he never got around to making a full EP. He was usually seen in the company of his close friend and fellow rapper, Lil Durk. The pair were inseparable and even collaborated on a few tracks.
La Capone – Biography
The rapper was born in Chicago, Illinois as Leonard Anderson on September 18, 1996. He was still a child when his parents split up. As a result of the divorce, his mother, Dedra Morris was given custody of little Leonard and he spent his growing years with her.
Growing up on the streets of Chicago, La Capone’s influences in life and music were unsurprising, predictable even. He was a student of the Chicago-based rap sub-genre known as “Drill music” from his early days of listening to rap music. It did not take long for La Capone to immerse himself in almost everything that the Drill music elevated – particularly violence, drugs, and gang life.
He was just 11 years old when he joined the rap collective known as “Only the Family”. It was a group formed by his friend Lil Durk and included other rappers as well. He soon started gaining prominence and recognition as he featured on songs by Lil Durk and the likes of RondoNumbaNine. As his videos with Lil Durk and other emcees made the rounds online, so did his name and his fan base began to grow, surpassing over 100,000 followers in a short time.
During his lifetime, he released a few singles of his own which he posted on his own personal social media accounts. Tracks like “The Gat”, “Round Here”, and “So loud” were some of his most popular tracks.
Life and Death of the American Rapper
The rapper grew up in a culture of drugs and gangs and he made no intention to hide it. In fact, it became a part of his persona. In his videos, he would frequently show himself smoking marijuana and repping the gang lifestyle. Speaking of gangs, La Capone was a member of the “Black Disciples”, a known gang in the Chicago area along with his friend Lil Durk and prominent rapper Chief Keef. It was shortly after he became a member of the gang that he took on the stage name La Capone and started doing music.
Leonard was on the rise in the music world when his life was tragically cut short in 2013. On September 26, 2013, the rapper was at Stony Island Avenue in Chicago. He had just been in a studio session where he had just recorded a song. Around 6:25 pm, he was on his way back with a friend and he had to walk down an alley to get to his car.
They were accosted by a gunman as soon as La Capone reached his car. One of the shots hit his thigh and another bullet navigated its way to his lower back causing severe bleeding. He was rushed to the nearby Northwestern Memorial Hospital. On two occasions, the doctors had stopped the bleeding, but they were unsuccessful the third time around. He was pronounced dead at around 8:30 pm on account of severe loss of blood.
The rapper had just turned 17 years old the week before his death. His mother Dedra revealed that the chocolate cake she had made for him was still at home waiting for him. She also revealed that his quick death was shocking because he had survived a gun attack around the same time in 2012.
La Capone’s death was believed to be gang-related. At the time of his death, he was a member of a gang known as ‘600’, a rival gang to the ‘Black Disciples’, and ‘051 Young Money’. In August the following year, three men, Sakhee Hardy-Johnson, Michael Mays, and Meiko Buchanan were arrested in connection to his death. Both Mays and Johnson were members of 051 Young Money, while the third person, Meiko, was believed to be a driver.
A mixtape was released posthumously in his name by a group of his emcee friends. The collection was titled King LA and featured some of the deceased rapper’s most successful singles.
