Boosie BadAzz

Concentration Camp to Trill

Torrence Ivy Hatch Jr. was born on 14 November 1982 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, to a mother who worked as a school principal. His father died in 1997. He was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes as a child, a condition he has managed throughout a touring career that has rarely let up.

He joined the Baton Rouge collective Concentration Camp in 1998 and put out his first album, Youngest of da Camp, in 2000, aged seventeen. The following year he signed to Trill Entertainment at the urging of Pimp C, and in 2002 released For My Thugz under the name Lil Boosie. The partnership that shaped the rest of his working life came next: Ghetto Stories in 2003 and Gangsta Musik in 2005, both shared with Webbie, which together fixed the sound of Baton Rouge rap in the 2000s — blunt hooks, heavy low end, local detail. Warner Bros. Records signed him in January 2005.

The records that landed

Bad Azz, his major-label debut in 2006, reached number three on the Billboard 200. Its single "Zoom", with Yung Joc, peaked at 61 on the Hot 100 and was certified platinum. "Wipe Me Down" followed in 2007, peaking at 38 and eventually certified five times platinum — the song that still does most of the work in a live set two decades on. His highest chart placing came as a guest: Webbie's "Independent", featuring him, hit number nine on the Hot 100 in 2008, the same year DJ Khaled's "Out Here Grindin'" put him at 38.

Superbad: The Return of Boosie Bad Azz reached number seven in 2009, the year he founded his own imprint. Incarcerated, assembled in 2010 while he was facing charges, did what its title said. After release, Touch Down 2 Cause Hell went to number three on 26 May 2015 and BooPac to 38 on 15 December 2017.

What followed was volume rather than chart position: Boosie Blues Cafe in 2018, Badazz 3.5 in 2019, Heartfelt in 2022, Lines for Valentines in 2023 — the last two charting nowhere. The running tally stands at thirteen studio albums and more than forty mixtapes, a release rate that has kept the catalogue in circulation without ever producing a second "Wipe Me Down".

Eight years of court, five years inside

The legal record is inseparable from the discography. An arrest in 2008 with marijuana and a firearm led to a 2009 guilty plea on drug charges and a four-year term, doubled to account for a probation violation. In 2010 he was indicted for the first-degree murder of Terry Boyd. On 29 November 2011 he was sentenced to eight years on separate drug distribution charges, and on 11 May 2012 a jury found him not guilty of the murder. He was released on 5 March 2014 after five years in custody.

He changed his stage name from Lil Boosie to Boosie Badazz in October 2014 and signed to Atlantic. In November 2015 he was diagnosed with kidney cancer and had surgery. His memoir, Cross The Tracks, came out on 20 September 2022.

Where things stand in 2026

The current chapter begins with a San Diego traffic stop on 6 May 2023, in which two loaded handguns were found. A second firearm arrest followed on 14 July 2023, with release on $50,000 bond on 21 July. Federal charges were brought on 18 July 2024, and he pleaded guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition. In January 2026, US District Judge Cathy Ann Bencivengo departed from prosecutors' request for a two-year prison term and sentenced him instead to three years of supervised release, 300 hours of community service and a $50,000 fine.

Running alongside that case is a stranger one. In 2025 he paid the political operatives Jacob Wohl and Jack Burkman $600,000 on the claim that they could get a presidential pardon in front of the White House. No pardon came. In July 2026 he filed a $10m federal suit against both men; the contract reportedly carried a clause promising a $300,000 refund if the pardon was not obtained, which Burkman's firm disputes. Administration officials said they had never been contacted by either man on his behalf. In September 2026 he posted what he said were texts from the broker.

The music has not slowed for any of it. Grown Man Talk arrived on 14 February 2026 and the fourteen-track Cadillac Music on 18 March. Badazz Afrobeat, an eight-track, 27-minute collaboration with Kt Blingz, came out on 9 October through his own Badazz Music Syndicate. Then, on 24 October, Back At It — ten tracks in 29 minutes with Webbie, their first joint project since Survival of the Fittest in 2007. The pair sat down with Angela Yee on 23 October to talk it through, and the interview spread mainly for Webbie's deadpan interjections rather than anything about the record.

The show now

Most of his autumn 2026 arena work is as one name among many on the Cash Money & No Limit Tour, a Louisiana package built around Master P, Birdman, Juvenile, Mannie Fresh, Mia X, Silkk the Shocker and B.G., with meet-and-greet upgrades sold on top of the ticket. Dates run through Tampa's Benchmark International Arena on 7 November, the Lenovo Center in Raleigh on 8 November, Wintrust Arena in Chicago on 13 November with an 8pm start, Heritage Bank Center in Cincinnati on 14 November and Rocket Arena in Cleveland on 15 November. Shows under his own name fill the gaps: Montgomery Performing Arts Centre on 20 November, Indianapolis on 21 November, Thalia Mara Hall in Jackson on 27 November and the Jackson Convention Complex on 5 December.

The most interesting thing on the calendar is a departure. The Black Tie Experience, promoted by Stage View Presents, puts his catalogue in front of The Signature Orchestra at Little Rock's 2,222-seat Robinson Center on 2 January 2027, doors at 7pm for an 8pm start, with tickets running roughly $91 to $194. A promoter's line about giving audiences a different way to hear the songs is about as much as has been said publicly.

His own annual event moved in 2026. Boosie Bash VII ran at the Cajundome in Lafayette on 9 May, the first time the Bash has been staged outside Baton Rouge since it began in 2017, with YFN Lucci, Plies, Sexyy Red, Big Boogie, B.G., YKNiece, Baby Mel and Flau'jae on the bill. Earlier in the year he headlined the University of Louisiana Monroe's Spring Fever concert at Fant-Ewing Coliseum on 23 April, following sets from Damar Jackson, Snug Brim and 38 Deezie, each of whom leaned on their Louisiana ties for a student crowd that did the same.