Biology and hip-hop aren’t often put together. But when Julien Turner tried it out, the result went viral.

Turner is a sophomore business marketing major at Morehouse College in Atlanta. A linebacker on the Morehouse football team, Turner created a biology-themed parody of rapper Lil Uzi Vert’s “XO Tour Llif3” that has gone viral after being posted on YouTube in early November.

Since then, the video entitled “XY Cell Llif3” has been viewed more than 850,000 times on YouTube and has been featured in news outlets such as the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and ABC News.

Turner appeared on ABC’s “Good Morning America” last week with his biology professor, Dwann Davenport. As Turner explained in a tweet, Davenport presented her class with an enticing extra credit opportunity: If a student made a music video covering any of the material taught in class, she would curve the student’s grade.

The Columbus, Ohio, native took inspiration from Lil Uzi’s hit song, which reached No.7 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was voted “Song of the Summer” at the MTV Video Music Awards in August.

With help from his brother Justen and several Morehouse football teammates, Turner wrote and produced the viral video. Featuring lyrics such as, “If my genes go left unread / all my cells are dead,” Turner’s video tackles the biological process of cell division.

The Daily Orange spoke with Turner about his inspiration for the video and how the project panned out with his professor.

The Daily Orange: How did the idea for the video form?

Julien Turner: I was basically just listening to music, and “XO Tour Llif3” came on. I remembered that we had an extra credit assignment due, and so I just started formulating lyrics from that song, and “All my cells are dead” was one of the most prominent lyrics that I heard in my head. From then I just made a rap around it.

The D.O.: Have you ever done anything like this before?

J.T.: Yeah, I made songs for fun with my friends before, just messing around. I’ve made raps for my classes before, but I’ve never really posted them.

The D.O.: What was your reaction when the video went viral?

J.T.: I was shocked; I didn’t expect it to blow up like that. I mean, I’m still in shock just by the numbers and amount of people that it’s reached.

The D.O.: What did your professor think?

J.T.: She thought it was pretty cool. I don’t know if she was more surprised at the reaction it got and it blowing up, or if she really liked the video. It’s kind of hard to tell, but I assume she liked it.

The D.O.: Did you get the extra credit?

J.T.: Oh, yeah.

Published on November 13, 2017 at 7:05 pm

Contact Jordan: jslazins@syr.edu