How King Von Was Moving In 2012 / He Was Death, Bruh

Submission 58

Part of a series on Rap / Hip-Hop. [View Related Entries]

About

How King Von Was Moving In 2012, also known by the phrasal template How X Was Moving In Y or the quote He Was Death Bruh, refers to a compilation of interviews with celebrities, rappers and former Chicago gang members talking about late rapper King Von, whom they all feared and likened to death, the devil or a demon. Meme creators exploited the video by replacing King Von with other characters, people and celebrities infamously known for their escapades during a particular year or period. Notable rappers and celebrities in the video included NLE Choppa and Charleston White, among others. Noteworthy quotes from the video include, "He was death, bruh! If he wanted you outta there, he'll go do it himself on feet by himself," "I cooked for the whole day," "Some people need to be gone, bro" and "One of Satan's greatest soldiers was King Von."

Origin

Compilations of rappers and celebrities talking about King Von's infamous history began surfacing en masse in 2023. For instance, on January 17th, 2023, TikToker^[1] @frmdao_otf6465 posted a video starting with a quote from fellow rapper NLE Choppa on DJ Akademiks' podcast.^[2] NLE Choppa says, "He was death, bruh! If he wanted you outta there, he'll go do it himself on feet by himself." The edit also included Charleston White saying, "One of Satan's greatest soldiers was King Von."

In a year, the TikTok edit received roughly 2.6 million plays and 211,700 likes (shown below).

Similar compilations of rappers and celebrities discussing King Von's life were posted on TikTok^[3] and YouTube^[4] in 2023.

The first known memetic usage of rappers talking about King Von was shared by X^[5] user @LeBeauJauneRoi on May 3rd, 2024, who reposted a viral TikTok^[6] and captioned it, "This TikTok about people celebrating King Von’s death had me crying last night," receiving over 1,600 likes in five months (shown below).

Spread

On June 21st, 2024, X^[7] user @Culturecams reposted the abovementioned video to quote a post about the rumor that Belgian footballer Kevin De Bruyne was leaving Manchester City, receiving over 4,600 likes in four months (shown below).

On September 29th, TikToker^[8] @jaypierlis posted a skit about how Chicago rappers talk about King Von. The TikToker used a distorted boom sound effect between each mock interview clip. Over 15 days, the video received roughly 1.4 million plays and 206,600 likes (shown below).

Going into October 2024, others on TikTok parodied the format, using the same distorted boom sound effect used in the abovementioned video by TikToker @jaypierlis.

For instance, on October 8th, 2024, TikToker^[9] @shitreallytragic shared a version reading, "How we explained this combo in 2018 Fortnite," gaining over 249,800 plays and 38,300 likes in a week (shown below).

The trend spread across social media in the following weeks. For instance, on October 14th, Twitter / X^[10] user @ChiefofIsaac shared an iteration about infamous Minecraft griefer popbob, gaining over 13,000 likes in a day (shown below).