A reformed drug dealer turned musician, Jelly Roll has not had a traditional trajectory to fame.
Jelly Roll, whose real name is Jason DeFord, says he has always been focused on music, even amid his illicit activity. “Even my drug dealing, to me, was always a means to music,” he told CBS Sunday Morning.
The “Save Me” singer says he optimized his drug deals, providing clients with his own mixtapes during exchanges. “I’m just like, ‘Yo. Here’s a sack of weed. Here’s a gram of coke. Here’s a mixtape … I rap too.’ It was like my business card.”
JELLY ROLL DETAILS DEPTHS OF ADDICTION: ‘I THOUGHT WE ONLY DRANK TO DO COCAINE’
Returning to his prison cell at the Metro-Davidson County Detention Facility in Nashville, Tennessee, for his interview, Jelly Roll is not looking to return to his roots. He admits his early days were riddled with bad influences. “I knew my father booked bets. I knew my mother struggled with drugs, so to me, this is just what you did,” speaking of his criminal past.
Instead of selling drugs, he now writes about the impact they have. Off his latest album, “Whitsitt Chapel,” Jelly Roll sings about both the heroin and fentanyl epidemics. “It shows what God can do … It shows how much change can happen in your life.”
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Now a Grammy-nominated musician performing on stages across the country, Jelly Roll still asks himself if his fame is appropriately earned. “I’m starting to, I didn’t at first,” he shares. “‘Do I really deserve this?’ I’m still a guy that’s haunted by my past. There’s a very dark hallway between my ears.”
He echoed these sentiments in an interview with People magazine late last year. “I’ve made a lot of peace with my past. I mean, it still haunts me like the ghosts I know, but I tell you what, I don’t think about doing no drugs today. As far as today goes, I don’t know about tomorrow, but I can tell you, today, right now, I’m happy,” he told the outlet.
Much of that happiness is rooted in giving back. The singer travels to centers across the country to play music, deliver food, and “do a little encouraging.”
“I always said that if I ever got in this situation, I would do everything I could to give back,” he said. “The fact that just me showing up places can make people happy is such a gift, and I feel like if God gave me that gift, I should show up.”
