Lee Arthur Carter (born October 7, 1971), known professionally by his stage name Viper, is an American

rapper Rapping (also rhyming, spitting, emceeing or MCing) is a musical form of vocal delivery that incorporates "rhyme, rhythmic speech, and street vernacular". It is performed or chanted, usually over a backing beat or musical accompaniment. The ...

record producer A record producer is a recording project's creative and technical leader, commanding studio time and coaching artists, and in popular genres typically creates the song's very sound and structure. Virgil Moorefield"Introduction" ''The Producer as ...

and

actor An actor or actress is a person who portrays a character in a performance. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and television. The analogous Greek term is (), li ...

. Carter has been producing music since childhood, but he received widespread attention online for his 2008 album, '' You'll Cowards Don't Even Smoke Crack''. The prolific nature of his work, together with his commitment to self production, has garnered him a cult following as an

outsider artist Outsider art is art made by self-taught or supposedly naïve artists with typically little or no contact with the conventions of the art worlds. In many cases, their work is discovered only after their deaths. Often, outsider art illustrates ...

, with comparisons drawn to rapper

Lil B Brandon Christopher McCartney (born August 17, 1989), professionally known as Lil B and as his alter ego The BasedGod, is an American rapper. Lil B has recorded both solo and with Bay Area group The Pack. His solo work spans several genres, i ...

and musician

Wesley Willis Wesley Lawrence Willis (May 31, 1963 – August 21, 2003) was an American musician and visual artist. Diagnosed with schizophrenia in 1989, Willis began a career as an underground singer-songwriter in the outsider music tradition. Wil ...

. He is also regarded as one of the originators of

cloud rap Cloud rap is a subgenre of Southern rap and trap music that has several sonic characteristics of lo-fi in its hazy, dreamlike and relaxed sound. Many music experts credit rapper Lil B and producer Clams Casino as the early pioneers of this styl ...

Biography

Early life

Carter was born in El Dorado, Arkansas. He began playing the piano at the age of five. At the age of six, he relocated to the

Hiram Clarke Hiram Clarke is an area in Houston, Texas, United States, southwest of NRG Park (formerly Reliant Park). History Hiram Clarke Road was named after Hiram Clarke, a Houston Lighting & Power Co. assistant general manager and executive vice president ...

neighborhood of

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 i ...

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

and started rapping at the age of nine. In 1997, he was an actor in the film '' Fifth Ward'', directed by his brother, Greg Carter.

Music career

Carter's first musical appearance was in 1997 on the soundtrack for ''Fifth Ward'', under the name "J-Ride". Originally under the artist name Lee Dogg, Carter released his first album, ''Lee Dogg'', on October 7, 2003, which would later be renamed ''Hustlin' Thick''. The album was created mostly in collaboration with various artists signed to local music label

Dope House Records Dope House is an independent record label based in Houston, Texas.Lomax, John Nova. "South Park Monster." ''Houston Press''. Thursday June 6, 20025 Retrieved on February 6, 2011. "On a hot July day two years ago, the deputy constable from Preci ...

at the time, whom he thanks multiple times in the liner notes. Carter planned to continue releasing albums under the Lee Dogg name and had numerous plans for collaborations, but for unknown reasons this never happened, and he retroactively changed both the name of his album to ''Hustlin' Thick'' and his artist name to Viper. Carter continued to release mixtapes regularly throughout the early 2000s under his ''Rhyme Tyme Records'' label through the CD Baby website, becoming one of the first

artists. Throughout this period he showed frustration at his obscurity and limited exposure, as detailed on one of his early songs, "9900 Haters On The Wall", where he claimed out of ten thousand people who heard his albums on the site, only a hundred had bought them. His obscurity would continue until early 2013, when the title track of his album '' You'll Cowards Don't Even Smoke Crack'', released in 2008, was posted onto

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...

. Since then it has garnered over three million views, and news outlets started reporting on him shortly after. '' You'll Cowards Don't Even Smoke Crack'' is by far Carter's most popular album. University of Notre Dame newspaper ''

The Observer ''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. It is a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', whose parent company Guardian Media Group Limited acquired it in 1993. First published in 1791, it is the ...

'' noted that the album became an " internet meme due to its shockingly upfront title and unique album cover". Despite the heavily independent and lo-fi nature of the album, it received positive coverage in the music press.

Sputnik Music Sputnikmusic is an American music community website offering music criticism and music news alongside features commonly associated with wiki-style websites. The format of the website is unusual in that it includes both professional and amateur c ...

wrote that the album fuses "a nostalgic and ethereal blend of

and

vaporwave Vaporwave is a microgenre of electronic music, visual art style, and Internet meme that emerged in the early 2010s. It is defined partly by its slowed-down, chopped and screwed samples of smooth jazz, elevator, R&B, and lounge music fro ...

". The '' Chicago Reader'' wrote that the album is "outsider-artist genius. People on the Internet are initially drawn to Carter because of his blatant disregard for grammar, outrageously violent and drug-centric lyrics, and how sonically bizarre he is in general." Since then, Carter has remained active, releasing almost an album per day on average in 2014, often consisting of recycled or

chopped and screwed Chopped and screwed (also called screwed and chopped or slowed and throwed) is a music genre and technique of remixing music that involves slowing down the tempo and deejaying. It developed in the Houston hip hop scene in the early 1990s by D ...

material, while making his music available on

Spotify Spotify (; ) is a proprietary Swedish audio streaming and media services provider founded on 23 April 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. It is one of the largest music streaming service providers, with over 456 million monthly active us ...

and iTunes and giving interviews to the local music press. As of 2020, he has released more than 1,500 albums, although only approximately 15 or so consist of solely original material. In early 2019, he created a YouTube channel, named RapperViper VEVO, which mainly consists of fan-made music videos to his music. The channel also occasionally posts green screen videos of Carter, which fans can use to make their own videos.

Personal life

Carter has four children; one born in 2002, two with his ex-wife, and the most recent being born in October 2020. He claims to believe he is the second Christ, and refers to himself as "Black Jesus" and is a devout Christian. In 2021, Betty Carter, Carter's mother, died at the age of 79. Carter regularly wears tight women's

shapewear Kim Kardashian in Shapewear-dress A foundation garment (also known as shapewear or shaping underwear) is an undergarment designed to impermanently alter the wearer's body shape, to achieve what some view as a more fashionable figure. The func ...

, which he refers to as "the hornace (harness) of death" or "THOD". He wears multiple THODs at a time, and claims that the pain felt from wearing the shapewear strengthens his "resolve to be number #1". Carter also alleges that wearing shapewear made him contract

pneumonia Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of productive or dry cough, chest pain, fever, and difficulty breathing. The severi ...

in 2016, which he says nearly killed him.

Style

His low-budget,

DIY "Do it yourself" ("DIY") is the method of building, modifying, or repairing things by oneself without the direct aid of professionals or certified experts. Academic research has described DIY as behaviors where "individuals use raw and sem ...

aesthetic is present not only in his music but also its accompanying videos and album art, which frequently consist of simple self-portraits,

clip art Clip art (also clipart, clip-art) is a type of graphic art. Pieces are pre-made images used to illustrate any medium. Today, clip art is used extensively and comes in many forms, both electronic and printed. However, most clip art today is creat ...

and his name and the album title superimposed in plain text. Musically, he is recognized for his deep voice, occasional use of

autotune Auto-Tune (or autotune) is an audio processor introduced in 1996 by American company Antares Audio Technologies. Auto-Tune uses a proprietary device to measure and alter pitch in vocal and instrumental music recording and performances. Auto-T ...

, and slowed-down, low-fidelity and glitchy and ethereal production predating

or the chopped and screwed subgenre native to Carter's Houston scene.

Partial discography

Carter has released hundreds of albums. However, a vast majority of these releases contain songs that have been chopped and screwed, slowed down, or simply recycled and put under different names with no change to their content. Therefore, only releases which contain original material have been listed here.

Studio albums/mixtapes

* ''Hustlin' Thick'' (2003, originally under the name ''Lee Dogg'') * ''Ready and...Willing'' (2006) * ''Heartless Hoodlum'' (2006) * ''The Southwest Hooligan'' (2006) * '' You'll Cowards Don't Even Smoke Crack'' (2008) * ''The Paper Man'' (2008) * ''The Hiram Clarke Hustler'' (2009) * ''These Rappers Claim They Hard When Them Fags Never Even Seen the Pen'' (2010) * ''5-9 Piru Music: The Gang, the Album, the Label'' (2013) * ''Kill Urself My Man'' and ''I Have The Best Piece and Chain Ever Made!'' (partially) (2013) * ''Rich and NOT Famous'' (2013) * ''Tha Top Malla'' (2015) * ''Death from in Front'' (2016) * ''Shed Skin: Tha Hidden Treasures, Vol. 1 (1997-2017)'' (2022) * ''Thug's Renditions: Tha Hidden Treasures, Vol. 2 (2017-2018)'' (2022) * ''Pussy Boy Ill Kill Ya (All I Need Is Tha Money): Tha Hidden Treasures, Vol. 3 (2018-2022)'' (2022) * ''Ya'll Cowards Don't Even Smoke Crack (You'll Cowards Don't Even Smoke Crack II)'' (2023)

Collaborative albums/EPs

* ''Death 2 Snitches'' (EP) (with Nmesh) (2015) * ''World Rap Star'' (with Nolan) (2017) * ''Bout tha Money'' (with Broken Machine Films) (2018)BOUT THA MONEY , Illuminated Paths
''Bandcamp'', retrieved May 12, 2020 * ''They Hate Me Cuz I'm Vaporwave'' (with Nmesh and KOJA) (2018) * ''Leftovers: Tha Hidden Treasures, Vol. 4'' (EP) (2022)

Filmography

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Viper African-American male rappers African-American record producers American hip hop record producers Bloods People from El Dorado, Arkansas Gangsta rappers Outsider artists Outsider musicians Rappers from Houston Southern hip hop musicians Self-declared messiahs Underground rappers University of Houston alumni Record producers from Texas 1971 births Living people 21st-century African-American people 20th-century African-American people Cloud rap musicians Vaporwave musicians