Never make permanent decisions on temporary feelings. – Machine Gun Kelly
You’ll know the name Machine Gun Kelly if you’re into hip-hop. The artist is an American rapper and rock star with a net worth of $25 million. He is famous for his beef with rap icon Eminem, and he’s one of the few rap stars, along with Cypress Hill, to transition from hip-hop to the punk rock and metal scene.
During his career, he built a reputation as one of the biggest names in music in the 2010s. He’s also well-known for his marriage to actress Megan Fox. The couple frequently appears in the media acting out a strange fantasy, wearing vials of each other blood around their necks and other odd behavior that attracts plenty of attention.
Machine Gun Kelly: The Facts
Net Worth: | $25 Million |
---|---|
📆 DOB: | April 22, 1990 |
🌎 Country of Origin: | United States of America |
💲 Source of Wealth: | Rapper |
✅ Updated: | 2023 |
Machine Gun Kelly started his career in the rap game, collaborating with top artists in the genre. After dominating the rap market, the artist shifted his creative prowess to punk rock. Many critics suggested the artist would lose his core audience, but they were wrong.
His career as a rocker is just as successful as his time in the rap game, and he retains a huge following. The rapper has a YouTube channel with nearly 9 million subscribers, and his music videos receive millions of views. His Eminem diss track, ‘Rap Devil,’ saw the artist rack up 357 million views to date.
Machine Gun Kelly – The Early Years
Born on April 22, 1990, in Houston, Texas, Richard Colson Baker is the son of two missionaries. The rapper grew up in a religious household, which may explain why he rebelled into a somewhat satanic persona later in his career.
The soon-to-be rapper traveled the world with his parents, spending time in many different countries as a child. Some of the destinations visited on his travels include Germany, Egypt, and the Middle East. As a child, Baker also lived in several states as his family moved around the continental United States.
After finishing their missionary work, the artist settled with his family in Denver, Colorado. His mother and father had disagreements and ended up divorcing, with his mother leaving the family. After the divorce, MGK moved in with his aunt in Cleveland, Ohio.

MGK considers Cleveland his home state, and it was there that he started to show an interest in music. The artist famously skipped an entire semester of schooling to work on his rap talent while lying to his father about taking time off.
Baker states he was bullied as a teen and started rapping as a way to torment his bullies with words instead of fists. His father eventually left the family to work for the US Army in Kuwait in the Middle east. After his father’s departure, MGK moved into a friend’s basement, where he started experimenting with drugs.
He recorded ‘Stamp of Approval,’ his first mixtape, during this time. After his father discovered he was skipping school to concentrate on rapping and doing drugs, he forced the youth to move with him to Kuwait.

Machine Gun Kelly – Career
After cleaning up and returning to the US to finish his schooling, MGK convinced a local manager to help him launch his rap career. This was around when he came up with his stage name, ‘Machine Gun Kelly.’ He liked the moniker since it referred to his fast-paced lyrical delivery.
MGK began his career performing at local hip-hop venues. He worked tirelessly, eventually landing a gig at Harlem’s Apollo Theater. The rapper also appeared on ‘Sucker Free Freestyle’ on MTV2, releasing his second mixtape, ‘100 Words and Running.’
While the rapper was gaining industry exposure and a name for himself in the rap game, he struggled financially. His father kicked him out of the family home because he saw no future in his son’s aspirations of hip-hop fame.
MGK knocked up his girlfriend during this time, becoming a father himself. He recalls working at a local Chipotle to support himself. The rapper managed to take a step forward in his rap career after releasing the single ‘Alice in Wonderland.’

The song earned the rapper several awards, increasing his notoriety in the hip-hop community. The release of his second mixtape saw the rapper dedicate one of the tracks to the Cleveland Cavaliers basketball team, with the team playing it at home games.
The rapper’s career was gathering steam, and he collaborated with Juicy J for the hit single, ‘Inhale’ in 2011. After this commercial success, MGK caught the attention of Sean Combs, aka ‘P. Diddy,’ signing him to his label, ‘Bad Boy Records.’
2012 saw the rapper release his first studio album, ‘Lace Up.’ The album featured the hit singles ‘Wild Boy’ and ‘Invincible.’ He also collaborated with top artists like Twista, Tech N9ine, and DMX on the album. That same year, MGK collaborated with other industry powerhouses like Meek Mill and Pusha T on his next mixtape, ‘Black Flag.’
In 2015, MGK eventually released his second studio album, ‘General Admission,’ after lengthy delays. The artist followed up on the album’s success with the release of ‘Bad Things,’ where he collaborated with Camila Cabello to create the hit single.
The artist released his fourth studio album ‘Hotel Diablo’ in 2019. This work included the hit singles, ‘Glass House,’ and ‘I Think I’m Okay.’ Hotel Diablo debuted at number five on the Billboard Hot 100 that year. Later that year, MGK revealed his 2020 album, ‘Tickets to my Downfall,’ would feature a collaboration with Travis Barker, promising his fans something completely different.
Many industry pundits claimed that MGK made a huge mistake by shifting from hip-hop to punk rock. However, they proved to be wrong, with the rapper’s fanbase gladly following the artist’s evolution. The album was a roaring commercial success, with its top singles taking up half the slots on Billboard’s Hot Alternative Songs chart.
‘My Ex’s Best Friend’ was the lead single from the album, and MGK went on to go platinum with the album, selling 11.5 million certified units in digital singles.

Machine Gun Kelly – Eminem Beef
MGK is well-known for his beef with legendary rap icon Eminem. While the hostility between the two peaked in 2018, it started in 2012. MGK posted a 2012 tweet describing Eminem’s daughter, Hailie Mathers, as ‘hot.’
MGK said the following about the rapper’s daughter.
“[O]k, so I just saw a picture of Eminem’s daughter, and I have to say, she is hot as fu*k.”
Eminem is known for being very protective of his daughter and frequently refers to her in his songs. He even wrote ‘Hailie’s Song’ to commemorate his feelings for his child. So, it was no surprise to see the rapper take offense to MGKs tweet.
However, it took over a year for the tweet to come across Eminem’s radar. At the time, MGK didn’t have a huge reputation, but Eminem was on alert, waiting for the rapper to slip up in the future. It was nearly six years before everything would boil over between the superstar rappers.
MGK featured on Tech N9ne’s 2018 hit single, ‘No Reason.’ In his verse on the song, MGK took a stab at Eminem, referencing his ‘Rap God’ track. On the Kamikaze album, Eminem returned the diss on his track, ‘Not Alike.’
MGK decided it was time to take the gloves off, publishing ‘Rap Devil’ as a direct diss to the king of rap music. Eminem went public with his feud with MGK in an interview with Sway Calloway, where he said the following.
“The reason I dissed him is actually a lot more petty than that. The reason that I dissed him is because he got on—first, he said, ‘I’m the greatest rapper alive since my favorite rapper banned me from Shade 45’ or whatever he said, right? Like I’m trying to hinder his career.
I don’t give a fu*k about your career. You think I actually fu*king think about you? You know how many fucking rappers are better than you? You’re not even in the fu*king conversation.”
Responding to ‘Rap Devil,’ Eminem releases the diss track ‘Killshot,’ which industry pundits widely regard as the better of the two. The pair haven’t launched any further diss tracks against each other since the 2018 feud. However, Eminem did mention MGK out of turn during an interview in 2020.

Machine Gun Kelly – Personal Life
MGK has a daughter from a previous relationship with Emma Cannon. Casie was born in 2009, long before MGK experienced commercial success. The rapper dated several models and musicians, including Sommer Ray and Amber Rose.
However, the rapper gained international media attention after announcing his relationship with Hollywood A-lister Megan Fox. The couple met at the movie ‘Midnight in the Switchgrass’ during filming in 2020.
At the time of the couple’s first meeting, Fox was unhappily married to Brian Austin Green. Two months later, MGK and Fox were spotted together after rumors of a split between the Beverly Hills 90210 star and Fox.
Green confirmed he and Fox called it quits after 10 years during his podcast published in May 2018. The couple had three sons together, Noah, Bodhi, and Journey. During the podcast, he referred to Fox and MGKs relationship as the couple being just friends, but that was not the case.
MGK and Megan Fox announced their engagement on January 11, 2022. During an interview after his performance in Cleveland in August 2022, MGK referred to Fox as his wife.
“I talked to my wife before I got on stage tonight. She said, ‘When you’re on stage, you’re where you love to be. Don’t think about anything, you don’t have to prove anything to anybody. They all came to see you, so just give them the best f–king performance of their life.”

Machine Gun Kelly – Real Estate
The rapper rented a home in Sherman Oaks, California, in 2020, with a monthly rental fee of $30,000. However, the rapper decided to purchase some real estate in 2020, paying $7.5 million for a seven-bedroom, nine-bath property in the Rancho Estates in Encino, California.
He purchased the property from the social media influencer Logan Paul, who bought the home for $6.6 million. The influencer listed the property for $9 million before settling on MGK’s offer. Celebrity real estate brokers ‘The Altman Brothers’ handled the deal, describing the property as an “ultra-private contemporary compound.”
MGK also has a decent supercar collection, featuring an Aston Martin DB11 valued at $200,000, a Lamborghini Gallardo with a similar price tag, and a Rolls Royce Phantom worth $562,000.
He also owns a Mercedes-Benz S-Class and a classic 1979 yellow Chevy Camaro. The rap/punk superstar also has a collection of motorcycles, including a BRP Can-AM Spyder Roadster and a Harley Davidson.

Machine Gun Kelly Quotes
Whatever you love could be taken away, so live like it’s your dying day.
Toast to the underdog, toast to the team, toast to the fact we this close to the dream.
Life is too short to live the same day twice. So each new day make sure you live your life.
I’m walking through the fire because there is no way around.
I don’t think that a lot of people understand, that the person who’s crazy enough to think he can change the world, actually can.
What is love, love is pain. Love is butterflies and stomach aches, love is looking out a windowpane. Tears dripping looking like you’re in the rain, for somebody you don’t even know, but somebody you may never see again.
I used to take orders, now I make bets. I used to scrub floors, now I sign checks. And I used to push carts, now I push songs. I used to be there, now I am so gone.
When my times up on this earth and they bury me in that dirt, don’t say that I ain’t milk this life for everything that it’s worth.
I came out of a dying city, brought back life. Everything they said I couldn’t do I did about twice.
Trust is like an eraser. It gets smaller with every mistake.
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