Born Bashar Barakah Jackson on July 20, 1999, in Brooklyn, New York, to a Jamaican mother and a Panamanian father. He spent his childhood in the Canarsie section of Brooklyn, where, among other things, he began drug dealing. At 16, he bought himself a BMW 5 Series and spent two years on house arrest after being arrested on weapons charges. He began his music career in 2018 while hanging out with other artists recording during their studio sessions, initially remixing popular songs within New York City's drill music scene before starting to create original music. In an interview with Genius, he mentioned that his artist name Pop Smoke is a mix of Poppa (a nickname given to him by his Panamanian grandmother) and Smoke (a nickname given to him by childhood friends).
In April 2019, he released his standalone song, "Welcome to the Party," the lead single on his debut mixtape, "Meet the Woo." The song was later remixed twice, one featuring Nicki Minaj and the other featuring Skepta in August 2019. The song gained attention for its use in UK drill production, which was later seen throughout his works. This was due to his frequent collaboration with British drill producer 808Melo. His other famous songs include "Mpr," "Flexin," and "Dior." After the rise in popularity of "Welcome to the Party," he collaborated with other famous artists on individual tracks such as "War" featuring Lil Tjay and "100k on the Coupe" featuring Calboy. In December 2019, he collaborated on "Gatti" with JackBoys and Travis Scott, the latter track being on the JackBoys album (2019) by Scott and members of Cactus Jack.
In February 2020, Pop Smoke released his second music tape, Meet the Woo 2, featuring Quavo, A Boogie wit da Hoodie, Fivio Foreign, and Lil Tjay. Within five days of its release, a deluxe edition with three new songs was dropped: "Wolves" featuring Nav, "Dior (Remix)" with Gunna, and "Like Me" featuring PnB Rock. Pop Smoke's album was first released after his death in May 2020. American rapper 50 Cent praised the late rapper and expressed interest in finishing the album with potential features from Roddy Ricch, Drake, and Chris Brown, while also promising to provide support to Pop Smoke's mother.
