Endless Thread - How Afroman turned lemons into lemon pound cake

Episode Date: April 10, 2026

When you think of rapper Afroman, chances are his early 2000s hit song "Because I Got High" is already playing in your mind. More than two decades later, his music has once again broken containment. Host Ben Brock Johnson and Producer Grace Tatter dig into how Afroman turned a police raid and defamation trial into another moment of internet virality. Show notes: Afroman surveillance footage (Instagram) "These lemon poundcake shirts are going fast !!!"(Instagram) Cop Says Afroman's False 'Pedophile' Claim Caused Him To Quit Sheriff's Office (YouTube) Credits: This episode was produced by Grace Tatter and Kalyani Saxena, and co-hosted by Grace Tatter and Ben Brock Johnson. It was edited by Meg Cramer. Mix and sound design by Marquis Neal. Sponsor message: 🌏 EXCLUSIVE NordVPN Deal ➼ https://nordvpn.com/ENDLESS Try it risk-free now with a 30-day money-back guarantee 👍

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Producer Grace Tatter. Host Ben Braff Johnson. I think that's Ben Laughman Johnson to you. Nice. I'm excited for this story that you have today. Thank you for bringing it. Yeah. Well, clearly you've gotten a head start on all of this.

But I do indeed have a story for you today about something I think we all wish we could do in our lives, which is taking a terrible experience and making something meaningful or even delicious out of it. You know, lemons into lemonade or pound cake, lemon pound cake, if you catch my drink. Yeah, let's pound this episode out. Let's pound cake this episode right out. Heck yeah. Okay, so this story starts back in 2000 with the song Because I Got High. Oh, yeah.

Come on, y'all. I could have cheated and I could have passed. I remember when this song came out. I'm taking it next semester and I know why. Because I got high. Because I got high. Because I got a... Grace, why don't you sing along with? Come on.

I've gotten... Come on, Grace. I think I've gotten... I've sung once on endless threads. It's a high bar to give you to say it. Yeah, you got to like, no, but you got to, we got to lower the bar. All right. So you remember.

Yeah. I remember. This came out when I was in college. And I do remember a very close friend of mine, Joe, being very very, very, into this song. And I was like pretty not into this song. Like I was like this,

it felt adolescent to me. Whereas like, I was like, no, I'm just listening to like the shins and modest mouse right now. You know what I mean? Yeah. This song came out. I was quite young when it came out,

but the first time I heard it was in middle school. It was a big hit on my middle school bus. And I think that perhaps speaks. to the adolescent tone. And yeah, we thought this song was hilarious. And I still chuckle. But it was also an early viral internet bop. It was a lot of people distributed it through Napster.

That was, yeah. And the song I do think just like was an instant meme, has so much meme potential. What do you think makes it so memeable? I think the reason that the song, as popular, is it sort of wisely connects to this kind of self-deprecating idea, right? Which is, like, I would have been a productive member of society, but I got high. And there's something that's both, like, you can kind of, like, brag about it and also make fun of yourself about it at the same time. I don't know. That would be my guess. It's just a very, like, distilled.

old idea. Yeah. It's potent. Yeah, I could see that. That wasn't even one of my theories, but I do think it's probably relatable. I actually was listening to an interview of Aframan talk about this, and he talks about how this song actually came out of like a lot of pain. And I think maybe he's referring to shame of like self-sabotage that he was, you know, going to go to class, but then he got high. And that might be a relatable feeling. But I also think my theories are, it's funny, like we said. Yeah. Its structure is very easy to parody. I was X, but then I got X.

So I think that helps with the meme ability, because I've definitely seen parodies of this, like, throughout the years since the song first came out. And it's catchy. It's like I've had it stuck in my head all week personally. And it's dank. That's the other thing. It's just super dank.

Exactly. Okay. So fast forward, nearly three decades. And Aframan is having another viral internet moment. Yes. This one starts in 2022. Officers from the sheriff's department in Adams County, Ohio, raided Afferman's house. According to their search warrant, they were looking for evidence of drugs, drug trafficking, and kidnapping.

Why? So the warrant claims that they had probable cause that drugs were on the property and of kidnapping and trafficking. But it doesn't list any specific evidence. and Afroman has said that those claims were totally baseless. Indeed, the officers didn't find any drugs or anything else illegal in his house. Afferman was never charged with anything. And this raid was extremely upsetting. He wasn't home at the time, but his children and wife were.

The officers broke down their door, came in with guns, and went through seemingly the entire house. They were opening CD cases. They were going through all of Afferman's suit pockets. And we know this because his wife was. was able to film some of the search with her cell phone. And the family also had a security camera system in place. So like I said, this was pretty upsetting. Afro-Man said it was traumatizing to his children in particular. He also suspected racism was involved. So he quickly started putting this footage on social media. And he's a funny guy. So he said that he turned his pain

into humor with Because I Got High. Same thing with this. He's very quickly making jokes about this raid. So I'm going to send you an Instagram post and first I want you to describe the visuals. So like what do we see? Okay. Like the camera angle, that kind of thing. Oh my God. So this is like surveillance footage inside his house with the cops in and one of the, one of the police, they all have like bulletproof vests. One of them has one of those like, oh my God, it's like a a crowd control shield. They're walking through this kitchen. But also, like, interestingly, there's a finger.

It's like a, it's like a recording of something on a screen. And there's a finger pointing around the screen. There's a cake on the table with a nice inside of a nice little glass cake case as these officers are kind of like walking through the kitchen. So, yeah, Aframan is like filming himself pointing out. things in the footage. That's why we see his finger. But the footage itself is like from high up, kind of looking down in the kitchen. It looks like probably it was from security camera footage that they had in their house. And now I want you to listen to the audio.

Okay, now watch the physically challenged officer come in here. He's going to take a double take on the pound cake. Look at the pound cake. He going to, he want to shoot me here. He's going to the pound cake and he, hey man, that pound cake. And he didn't know where to shoot you. I cut him a slice of that lemon pound cake. He backed up. He wants him to that pound cake, Mike. So you had noted the lemon pound cake.

I thought I would say is the hero of this video. And I guess we do kind of see the officer. He, like, looks at the cake, pauses. I mean, he doesn't so much just, like, reach out for the cake. Aframan is definitely doing some creative, But yes, yes. He clearly double takes the cake, which who among us, if you will, but he double takes it. He double takes the cake and he and then he moves on. But he doesn't take his hands off his weapon. That's true. Yeah. Averman makes lots of videos about this and eventually releases an album with songs about this incident. One of the songs is fittingly called Lemon Pound Cake. He want to put down his glide Lemon pound cake

Trending on TikTok Limin' pound cake He's a family guy Oh boy Munchies Because he got high Lemon pound cake

Wow Pound cake Wow A bop Yeah it's another bop Before I got high before it And do you know The actual song this is based off of by the way?

Oh you know what? just learned this. It's under the boardwalk by the drifters. Under the boardwalk, boardwalk. There's also a second song called, will you help me repair my door? Will you help me

repair? Did you find what you was looking for? I think it's a catchy melody. I think both of these songs are very catchy, very funny, and they also did well on social media. And to promote, these songs, Aframan talked a lot about the officers who raided his house, who were in the music

videos for this song. And he even made merch about the officer who paused by the poundcake, whom he refers to as Officer Poundcake. Of course he does. Yes. But Aparman, he sells these t-shirts. He releases this album. I think he even sold the door that the officers broke down, or at least he posted about selling it on Instagram. And this, all happens in 2022, the raid and a lot of the content that he produces about it. And Averman recognizes that very quickly he's taken a scary, traumatizing incident and he's made money off of it. You know, as we said, he's taken lemons and made lemon pound cake. Oh boy. But the officers involved are not happy. Their response in a minute. At Radio Lab, we love nothing more than

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Recruit new talent. Reach new audiences. Whatever your goal, we can help. Discover how the magic is made. made at WBUR.org slash creative studio. So the Adams County Sheriff's Office raids Afro-Man's House in 2022. He starts making content about it pretty much immediately. Then in March of 2023, four of the officers who raided Afro Man's House sue him for defamation.

They accuse him of using their images for commercial purposes, like selling that t-shirt. That seems accurate. Yeah. And they said they suffered humiliation, ridicule, mental distress, embarrassment, and loss of reputation as a result of Afferman's content about the raid. Also, you know, not necessarily wrong in some ways. Like, yeah, this would not, this would not probably not be good for their reputation as law officers to be, you know, referred to, for instance, as a officer poundcake because you looked at the pound cake twice. So, okay. Totally. Yeah. So they asked for $3.9 million in damages and for the content to be removed

from the internet. The trial didn't take place until March of this year. But the primary questions that juries had to decide was not so much whether this was humiliating to the officers. It was whether or not Afro-Man's music and social media content about the rate counted as protected speech. Does the First Amendment apply here? Okay. So throughout the trial, lawyers read many of Afferman's posts about the officer's word for word, including one in which he claimed that one of the officers, Brian Newland, is a pedophile, which Newland, let's be clear, totally denies. Newland testified that he was actually forced to quit his quote-unquote dream job with the sheriff's office due to Afroman's social media posts. And then there's another officer,

Lisa Phillips, who cried in court after they showed a video of Afro-Man mocking her for having a low voice. Afro-Man also claimed that she has sex with women and has male genitalia, which she says is not true. Afro-man, for his part, was completely unfazed when he was asked about Phillips' emotional reaction to his creative work. You knew she was upset. Just like she knew I was upset when she was standing in front of my kids with an AR-15, with her hand around the trigger ready to shoot me. just like she knew I was upset when she cut my cameras, but I'm not a person. She is.

So I'm sorry for being a victim. Let's talk about the predators. So Ackerman's line, this whole trial, is like, if y'all hadn't raided my house, none of this would have happened. And Ackerman's lawyers weren't trying to make the case that these posts were true, right? They were arguing that the public knows not to take rap songs and a lot of comedy literally. His lawyer cited Cardi B's Wop as an example of this, except he called her, Carly B, which was funny.

Interesting. On Wednesday, March 18th, jury ruled in Afferman's favor on all counts after six hours of deliberation. They said that the speech was totally protected by the First Amendment. He can keep making these songs about these raids. He doesn't have to take any of them down, and he doesn't have to pay the officers anything. Is that it?

It's like case closed? We're done? Yeah, the case is closed. But it certainly lives on on social media. The trial particularly was everywhere. And once again, like, I have theories about what made because I got high, such good early internet fodder. I have some theories about why clips from this trial went so viral. Okay.

Do you have any or do you want me to go into that mine? I'm interested in yours. I mean, I guess, like, you know, during the trial, you also wore this, like, suit, this, like, American flag suit, which, You know, he he likes his, he likes his drip, clearly. But like, I found the kind of like trial footage that I was seeing to be thought provoking. And like, you know, he says like, I'm sorry for being the victim. Let's talk about the predators. He is very confident in the arguments that he is making.

And it's rare I find that you see someone who, you know, at least, in their previous public-facing existence was, I sort of read as like silly and ridiculous, is literally you see them in like a, you know, on the stand being quite thought-provoking and what they have to say about freedom of speech and where we should be directing our ire when it comes to this kind of thing. Totally. It's kind of these videos and the.

verdict kind of offer this moment of catharsis. This was a traumatic event for Afro-Man. And the top comments on these videos tend to agree with him that the officers used excessive force in the situation, that there was no reason for them to break down the door coming guns blazing, especially since there were kids in the house. And by making content about the raid, they feel that Afro-Man held the sheriff's department accountable and that his victory in court was a triumph of justice. Obviously something that we need to acknowledge here is that Afro-Man, you may be shocked to learn, is a black man.

And there's a whole lot to say about, you know, the way that our law enforcement apparatus in this country treats people of color when it comes to suspicion of possession of drugs. And that's a whole other layer here, obviously, to all of this. And I will say, Grace, that when I first started seeing this stuff pop off, it was in the R-slash black people subreddit. So I think in some ways I was seeing this, at least ostensibly, obviously, Reddit's anonymous. We don't know who's hanging out in there who's not.

But I was seeing this conversation go viral in communities that ostensibly were communities for people of color on Reddit, which I think is also interesting here. Yeah, a lot of people were celebrating him in the trial, and then we're certainly celebrating his victory. and the fact that he did not have to pay these officers $3.9 million and the stric sand effect, which we've talked about before, and which by trying to sue Afrman and making him take down this content, he actually drew way more eyeballs to it. So, like, the top comment on Lemon Pound Cake on YouTube is, I'd like to thank the Adam County Sheriff's Department

for introducing me to this song. I mean, what do you think about all of this? Yeah, I think it's a really interesting, I do think it raises a lot of interesting questions about the First Amendment about policing. I also think it demonstrates that Afro-Man is a very skilled entertainer who has understood, he's a one-hit wonder in some ways, but like he's consistently understood how to get people's attention. how to keep people's attention and like props to him for that. Yeah. I agree.

What's the suite that you would like to be forever associated with involving a nickname? Oh, man. If people start wanting to call me podcast producer ice cream cone, totally fine by me. That has a great connotation. I have no shame. I like it. How about you? Yeah, I'm trying to think, like, I love a donut.

Like, I'm just a sucker for a donut. So, like, you know, Donuts Johnson would be fine with me. I'll submit that to the, if it please the court. Donuts Johnson will be the thing that I would accept. And also, if folks have their own suite-based nicknames that they'd like to submit for consideration, please send them on in. Endless thread at WBUR.org. By the way,

yes, Afro-Man is still getting Lemon Poundcake from his lemon. Streams of his catalog were up 500% the week following the verdict according to Billboard. Endless Threat is a production of WBUR in Boston. This episode was produced by

Koyani Saxana and Grace Tatter and hosted by me, Ben Brock Johnson. And me, Grace Tatter. It was edited by Meg Kramer. Mix and sound design by Marquis Neil. The rest of our team is Amory Sebertsin, Dean Russell, Chiosna, Bernadot, Emily Jankowski, our production manager, Paul Vikas, and our managing producer, Sumit to Joshi. Endless Thread is a podcast about the blurred lines between getting high and getting justice.

Nice. Have an unsolved mystery and untold history or another wild story from the internet you want us to tell. You can email us. And if you want to send us a pound cake t-shirt from Afro-Main. Or a pound-cake. Yeah, we'll take pound cake too. We'll take it all. Just send us an email.

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That's a very simple question. Will we get there? Will it all be deployed? We're going to see. I just want to add in there that, yeah, we've talked a lot about the difficulties for shipping in getting to net zero. This is not the only thing that's going to be going on. Aviation is seeking to do the same thing, maybe even faster, and the other uses of petroleum

are all transitioning. You may think, and in some ways that makes the problem even bigger, there are other ways that it makes it easier. Some of the fuels that are used for shipping are very similar to those used for aviation. So as infrastructure gets built out, shipping can benefit. Find the full episode by searching for Is Business Broken, Wherever you get your podcasts and learn more about the Morotra Institute for Business, Markets, and Society at iBMS.bU.bunsch.bU.edu.