Hip-Hop’s Unlikeliest Icons: Promethazine Codeine Syrup Manufacturers
The companies that fuel purple drank’s kick.
Inside the recording studio at Screwed Up Records & Tapes, William Gibbs lights up a Black & Mild and pauses to consider how long he’s been sipping. Next to Gibbs—who’s better known as Will-Lean, a member of the legendary Houston hip-hop collective Screwed Up Click—is a tall, white Styrofoam cup. The concoction inside mixes Faygo Redpop, a strawberry-flavored cream soda, and promethazine codeine cough syrup, a prescription pain reliever and cough suppressant that’s also the main ingredient for any number of similar cocktails referred to as “drank,” “purple stuff,” “lean,” and “sizzurp,” among other names.
Gibbs decides he’s been sipping since the mid-’90s. “I feel like I’m checking myself into rehab or something,” he says as he ponders his history. “I don’t get high. I just drink it for the taste. It tastes as good as a motherf-----. Shit don’t do anything for me anymore, but I still do it.” He’s made good headway on his Redpop, and his relaxed vibe reflects it—the effects include numbness, lethargy, and euphoria.