MGK Details Sickness That Turned His Skin ‘Yellow’ as He Underwent Grueling Blackout Tattoo Journey in 2 Months

NEED TO KNOW

• In a new interview with Billboard Canada, MGK detailed a health scare he experienced while getting his blackout tattoo

• The rapper said his skin turned “yellow” during the grueling process, which he underwent in two months instead of the professionally recommended two years

• MGK debuted the ink in April 2024

Mind over matter for MGK.

Back in 2024, the rapper and dad of two debuted a massive blackout or “dark mode” tattoo covering the majority of his upper body, and in a new interview with Billboard Canada, he revealed how the physical transformation led to a serious illness.

The “Emo Girl” artist, 36, told the outlet in a June 8 interview that despite his tattoo artist warning him that the work would take two years to accomplish, he went against professional advice and endured the rigorous tattooing process within two months. Committing to undergoing the “near impossible” mission is how sickness struck.

MGK posing with his blackout tattoo
Credit: Machine Gun Kelly/Youtube

“After the first week, we hit my lymph nodes around my armpits and shoulders, and I got really sick. My skin was turning yellow. I wasn’t able to sleep. I stopped being able to move certain parts of my upper body,” he revealed.

Despite the toll it took on his body, MGK said he came out of recovery “extremely inspired.” He added, “Not just because of what I had done, but because of what I had to overcome.”

MGK explained that he approached the daring body art — which was done by artist ROXX — as he began thinking about his recent project, a mixtape titled Blog Era Boyz and made in collaboration with Wiz Khalifa.

“I was looking for a change that wasn’t just a sound wave,” he shared. “It had to be something physical.”

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As told by the outlet, MGK couldn’t “recognize himself” with the amalgamation of tattoos he already had. MGK looked at his reflection and thought, “Who the f— am I?”

He continued, “I saw death and drugs in all these patterns that I was literally writing on my body,” adding, “There were happy tattoos, sad tattoos, holy tattoos, hellish tattoos. It was like my bipolarity was screaming off my skin.”

Two years ago, MGK took his fans along on the grueling process on Instagram. In a video, which showed a clip of blood dripping in addition to wearing an oxygen mask while sitting in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber for healing, he called the journey “the most painful s— I’ve ever experienced in my life.”

Appearing on The Jennifer Hudson Show in September 2025, he said the tattoo was meant to “redesign what the human skin could look like.” And without undergoing anesthesia or numbing, he said, “I had to focus out, big mistake, but my morals stand.”

Read the original article on People