A History of 6ix9ine: Beefs, Billboard Hits, and Court Dates

From his breakthrough songs to racketeering charges, here’s a complete timeline of Tekashi 6ix9ine’s career.

6ix9ine timeline lead
Complex Original

Image via Complex Original/Makana Ching

6ix9ine timeline lead

The rise and fall of 6ix9ine has been dizzyingly rapid. The controversial Brooklyn artist had been making music and videos since around 2014, but it was only two years ago that even the savviest rap fans began to hear his name.

In an effort to make sense of it all, we chronicled the key moments in his career, starting from the point he began bubbling into the mainstream with early press appearances and songs that spread beyond a small circle of early adopters. By “key moments,” we mean major events musically and career-wise, his relationships with other artists, and legal concerns. From Billboard hits to guilty pleas, here are all the highlights and lowlights in the career of an artist who, for better and worse, we couldn’t look away from.

March 9, 2017: A young 6ix9ine makes cameo in ‘No Jumper’ vlog

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“Young Tekashi 6ix9ine,” as he calls himself, makes a surprise appearance alongside underground rapper Schlosser in a raunchy No Jumper vlog entitled “Oh What a Night.”

Adam22 tells Complex the story of how it happened. “There was another rapper who was really trying hard to get into my good graces, and he had sent me this tote bag with a picture of him basically fingering a woman in a hot tub full of lean pints,” he says. “Then he hit me up when I was in New York a couple weeks later, and he was like, ‘Yo, I got these girls, they really want to hang out with you.’ I'm like, ‘All right. I'm down to meet up and see what's going on.’ And so I meet up with him, and he's got 6ix9ine with them, but I don't know who 6ix9ine is at the time 'cause he's just some random kid with green hair.”

April 27, 2017: “Poles1469” video released

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The dynamic, desert-set “Poles1469” video serves as a big buzz-building moment for 6ix9ine. As of this writing, it is closing in on 134 million views.

April-May 2017: First tour

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6ix9ine’s very first concert takes place about as far away from his hometown as you can get. Thanks to the efforts of Slovakian scene leader Yaksha, leader of the record label Fck Them, who had already been releasing 6ix9ine’s videos for several years, the rapper travels to Eastern Europe in the spring of 2017 for a series of shows. You can see footage from his very first concert in Prague above.

July 24, 2017: No Jumper interview

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6ix9ine has his first major U.S. interview in the summer of 2017, on No Jumper. You can see it here or watch it above. Among the topics covered? His then-recent beef with former collaborator ZillaKami.

August 2017: ZillaKami exposes an old case

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Not long after the No Jumper interview, ZillaKami makes a post on Instagram that shows 6ix9ine “shirtless, his arms wrapped around a young woman seen wearing only a bra, who Zilla claims is 13 years old.” That post is picked up by the now-defunct Twitter account To Catch a SoundCloud Rapper.

6ix9ine responds with a Snapchat video where he sarcastically calls himself a “happy rapist.” Trippie Redd follows up on Instagram denouncing Tekashi: “I’m sorry brozay, 1400 don’t promote pedophiles. If we give n****s clout, we give n****s clout. It was an accident.”

All of this is in response to a time Hernandez was arrested in 2015 for use of a child in a sexual performance. The details of the case, which did indeed involve a 13-year-old girl, and in which the rapper pleaded guilty, would become widely known following a December 2017 Jezebel story.

September 10, 2017: “Gummo” video shoot

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With the help of his co-writer and best friend Andrew “Trife Drew” Green, 6ix9ine works for weeks on a song called “Gummo.” Originally a hook-less diss track (though its subject is not publicly known), the Pi’erre Bourne-produced song transforms into a sure-to-be smash hit that just needs a video. So 6ix9ine, with help from his friend Sequanne “Seqo Billy” McCargo, rounds up a bunch of people in Bed Stuy (or “Red Stuy,” as many of them called it) to provide a backdrop. The end result, which you can see here, still brings tourists to the area to get a look at the “‘Gummo’ house.”

October 8, 2017: “Gummo” video released

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“Gummo” is 6ix9ine’s final video to be released by Fck Them. The song becomes a sensation. The video has over 330 million views as of this writing, and the track is certified gold by early 2018.

But the release is not without controversy. Pi’erre Bourne claims that he wasn’t aware that his beat (part of a trio of beats the producer sent that also contained “Poles1469” and “Owee,” 6ix9ine’s then-manager tells us) was going to be used for “Gummo.” Bourne isn’t happy about it. “Fuck that ‘Gummo’ shit,” he comments on Instagram. “All y’all n****s doing weird shit some opps I swear.”

November 11, 2017: Trippie beef, continued

January 2, 2018: Casanova beef begins

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Casanova releases a video for his song “Set Trippin.” Many suspect that the clip’s barbs at fake gangsters are aimed at 6ix9ine. Among those who thought so? 6ix9ine himself, who hits back during a live performance shortly after, changing the lyrics of “Gummo” to include, “Shout out Casanova, but we fucked that n***a[’s] bitch,” while Cas was present.  

January 6, 2018: H-Town issues

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While visiting a mall in Houston, Texas, 6ix9ine reportedly takes exception to a 16-year-old fan named Santiago Albarran shooting video of him. The rapper and his bodyguards surround Albarran, who went to the cops claiming that 6ix9ine choked him. Later, it is revealed that there was a warrant out for 6ix9ine’s arrest in the case. Albarran eventually changes his tune and says he didn’t want the rapper prosecuted.

January 18, 2018: Yams Day Brawl

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A fight breaks out at the annual Yams Day concert at the Bronx’s New York Expo Center. Witnesses say that 6ix9ine was at the center of the brawl’s beginning. The rapper denies it, saying on Instagram, “That had nothing to do with me.”

February 5, 2018: Gunshots in Minneapolis

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6ix9ine is in the Twin Cities for an appearance at Club Prive following a concert. Unsurprisingly, trouble starts. Ice buckets are thrown at the rapper, and there is an on-the-street confrontation that ends with gunshots, though it’s unclear by whom. 6ix9ine is unharmed, and brags about that fact on Instagram. “They will never touch me,” he says. “N****s can’t lay a finger on me, man.”

February 16, 2018: Canceled shows

February 21, 2018: Problems at LAX

Comments reportedly made by members of 6ix9ine’s crew to some women at LAX don’t go over well. Two men who are with the women start a fight outside the airport. 6ix9ine escapes unscathed, and brags to TMZ afterwards, “I'ma keep trolling these n****s. I'm not that hard to find.”

February 22, 2018: ‘Penitentiary rules’

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Members of a San Antonio-area prison gang called Tango Orejon don’t like the idea of 6ix9ine performing in their city. So on February 17, they release a video showing a few men holding weapons and threatening the rapper, saying they will impose “penitentiary rules” on him if he shows up. Their reasoning? “We don’t [mess] with no child molesters in our city.” Sure enough, the following Thursday, five men, including one who actually appeared in the video, are arrested at San Antonio International Airport.

February 23, 2018: ‘Day 69’ released

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March 1, 2018: The King of New York

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In a now-removed Instagram video, 6ix9ine calls himself “the king of New York.” His evidence? “If I wasn't the king of New York, y'all wouldn't pay me no mind. If I wasn't the king of New York, y'all would be like 'Just let that fucking clown talk, that n***a's irrelevant.’”

March 18, 2018: J. Prince problems

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6ix9ine thinks it is a great idea to attend a block party thrown by J. Prince Jr., son of Rap-A-Lot Records founder and Drake beef-ender J. Prince. However, given 6ix9ine’s widely-acknowledged refusal to “check in” with power brokers in cities he visits, J. Prince Jr. doesn’t think that the visit is such a good move. According to reports, Junior’s younger brother “swiftly handled the situation.” The party ends in gunfire, though there is no indication that 6ix9ine or his team are involved.

March 20, 2018: Attempted murder

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April 3, 2018: The robbery

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April 19, 2018: ‘I said I just turned 17’

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Babe publishes an article called We spoke to the woman Teka$hi 6ix9ine slept with while she was underage. Martha Gold, now 18, is the aforementioned woman. In the piece, she describes meeting 6ix9ine in March of the previous year, when she was underage. This is a different underage woman than the 13-year-old victim in the 2015 case mentioned above.

"I said I just turned 17. And he was like, 'Oh, okay,'" she told Babe, and confirmed that they had sexual contact “about six or seven times.”

April 19-21, 2018: Casanova beef, redux

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On April 19, Casanova is filming a video in Bed Stuy when shots are fired (you can see footage here.) Cops suspect that 6ix9ine’s crew is involved. Two days later, there are two more shootings, just hours apart. The government, in its initial indictment against 6ix9ine, says that he and two other people were out that afternoon shopping for clothes when they got into a “verbal altercation” with two (unnamed) people who were in a car. “[O]ne of the codefendants...approached the other vehicle and fired two rounds,” the indictment reads. “[T]he defendant [6ix9ine] can be seen [on surveillance video] getting out of his car and watching his codefendants fire those rounds.”

Only hours after that incident is the Adrien Broner fight at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. 6ix9ine and crew run into Casanova inside the arena, and a member of 6ix9ine’s camp reportedly fires a shot.

May 5, 2018: ‘I Kill People’

June 18, 2018: Changing his ways, maybe

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Following the murder of XXXTentation, 6ix9ine appears to reconsider trolling. “Sometimes I feel like I do too much trolling,” he says in an IG video. “I feel like someone might get the wrong image of me… [X] always called me on the phone: ‘Danny, are you okay?... Fuck all that beef shit.’”

June-July, 2018: The triumphant return

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Just over a year after his very first concert, 6ix9ine comes back to Europe for shows in Prague, Belgium, and elsewhere in the region.

July 11, 2018: Arrested at the airport

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July 20, 2018: Vic Mensa gets dragged in

August 14, 2018: Get the strap

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During a video shoot for the track “Get the Strap,” which features 50 Cent, Uncle Murda, Casanova, and 6ix9ine, eight shots are fired nearby. Luckily, no one is hurt. The following day, the NYPD tells XXL that they believed the gunfire was related to beef between 6ix9ine and Casanova.

In the song itself, 6ix9ine takes a shot at Keef by flipping a line from Keef’s song “Faneto.”

August 30, 2018: Praise from ‘Ye

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To the disbelief of host DJ Pharris, Kanye West praises 6ix9ine during a radio interview, saying, “I love his energy.” ‘Ye would go on to gift 6ix9ine a pair of unreleased Yeezys and design the invitation for a Tr3yway Entertainment pop-up. West would later pop up on two cuts on 6ix9ine’s Dummy Boy album.

September 1, 2018: Made in America

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6ix9ine has his first big festival performance in the U.S. at Made in America in Philadelphia. He gets onstage two hours late, and pays extended tribute to the then-recently-deceased XXXTentacion.

September 11, 2018: Yeezus

September 28, 2018: The raid

October 28, 2018: Surprise!

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6ix9ine pops up as a surprise guest at Power 105.1’s Powerhouse NYC concert in Newark. “It was a louder reception than even headliner Cardi B,” Vulture reports.  “Me, I never get invited to shit like this, ever,” 6ix9ine says from the stage. You can see footage from the performance below.

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November 4, 2018: Close to home

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6ix9ine gets into a verbal spat with YG affiliate Slim 400 outside of, um, ComplexCon in Los Angeles. Afterwards, Slim claims he “stopped that n***a at the door. 6ix9ine couldn’t get in.”

November 15, 2018: ‘I fired everybody’

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In a surprising sudden announcement, 6ix9ine announces that he has fired his whole team and cancelled the U.S. dates on his tour. In a follow-up interview with the Breakfast Club, the rapper explains that he was being robbed by his booking agency and promoters. MTA Booking denies 6ix9ine’s claims. He also speaks about “federal agents sitting in front of my house.” He adds, “There’s only two things I fear in life. I fear God, and I fear the FBI.”

November 24, 2018: The leak

February 6, 2019: Ex-girlfriend goes public with abuse claims

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Sara Molina, 6ix9ine’s ex-girlfriend and the mother of his daughter Saraiyah, tells the Daily Beast that the rapper abused her frequently during their years together. The first time, she claims, was when she was in Dubai with 6ix9ine in October, 2018. Molina would expand on some of the claims later that month in an interview with DJ Vlad.

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