I recently watched the Netflix documentary Running with the Devil: The Wild World of John McAfee, and it’s one of the craziest things I’ve seen in a long time. I’ve written about McAfee (who died in 2021) a few times over the years, and knew a few things about his chaotic and at times outright criminal life, but this sees filmmaker Charlie Russell and cameraman Robert King following and filming McAfee in 2012 and 2013 as he hides in Belize, escapes to Guatemala, and is deported back to the United States.
One of the most eye-popping moments in a documentary full of them comes when the raw footage suddenly segues into a rap music video for a song called The McAfee Effect by the Coin Bros (from 2018). As if that wasn’t enough, it soon emerges the video is being filmed at a luxurious property with John McAfee, who among other things we see sitting at a table with endless booze, a huge pile of gold bars, stacks of cash, a handgun, and a large pile of white powder that probably isn’t flour.
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Watch On
The lyrics to The McAfee Effect, annotated
What you know bout the streets?
What you know bout Belize?
Fairly simple to start off with: McAfee took a massive hit in the global financial crash of 2008, and emigrated to Belize, claiming he wished to escape US regulations and “materialism.”
What you know bout faking your own heart attack just to ditch the police!?
A classic: McAfee faked a heart attack while under threat of deportation, forcing his transfer to a hospital. Take everything McAfee says with a huge pinch of salt, but he later explained the incident on X:
“Did I really fake a heart attack while in prison in Guatemala?” writes McAfee. “A: Yes. Why? A: I was being deported back to Belize at noon. My lawyers needed until 2:00 to file a stay of deportation. I told them:
“Don’t worry. Get the Stay. I got the rest.”
What you know bout privacy?
McAfee’s fortune began with the antivirus company that bears his name, the slogan of which to this day is “McAfee Protects Your Privacy.”
I got a bad bitch on side of me
McAfee’s love life was as messed-up as all the rest of it, but he was never far away from women and enjoyed playing to that side of his character. This line may also be a pun on his love of dogs, though perhaps I am giving the Coin Bros too much credit there.
I got the FBI eyeing me
McAfee was indeed investigated by the FBI, and the file is now unclassified and can be viewed here.
All of these hackers are trying me
Tryna get them a peek, Tryna get all on my Twitter for the coin of the week
McAfee ran a “coin of the week” scheme in 2017 on X (then Twitter) which was essentially a “pump-and-dump” scheme. McAfee and his cronies would hoard or launch a crypto shitcoin of some kind, McAfee would use his profile to promote the coin, and then they’d all sell once the price spiked.
McAfee was indicted in the US on fraud and money laundering conspiracy charges in 2021 stemming from these crypto schemes, but died in a Spanish jail three months later.
I got China trying to ban every time that I speak
McAfee was an outspoken critic of China’s crackdown on cryptocurrencies, which is perhaps not surprising given his own activities. “Even the Chinese people are skeptical that China can enforce its Crypto ban,” he rather unconvincingly asserted in 2018. “For me, I am certain it cannot.”
Now we got Trump don’t you wish you voted for me
This might be the one line of the song I agree with. McAfee made a presidential bid in 2016, looking to become the Libertarian Party’s candidate. His platform, such as it was, involved lots of cybersecurity and anti-government stuff: he failed to secure the nomination. The 2016 US presidential election was, of course, won by Donald Trump.
I got An arsenal, an arsenal, a bunch of big guns, drugs, and some cards to pull
Cars, hoes with crypto paid in full
This all seems fairly self-explanatory.
A bunch of hating motherfuckers writing articles about….
Ah yes: the blasted press. Despite living a life straight out of the hedonist’s handbook, McAfee was often critical of his own media coverage and the media ecosystem more widely, which he said “manipulated people” whereas he “will not lie to people.”
The Chorus
We now get to the song’s hook, which begins by repeating “McAfee, McAfee, McAfee, John” three times before:
Don’t fuck with my dogs
Don’t fuck with my dogs
(Whoa)
These lines are unreal when you realise what the reference is. The most controversial incident in McAfee’s life occurred in November 2012, when he accused neighbour Gregory Faull of poisoning his dogs. The two had previously had multiple disputes over the dogs’ behaviour. The next day Faull was found shot to death, and McAfee was made a “person of interest” in the case, which led to him fleeing Belize for Guatemala.
McAfee was never charged with the murder, though in 2019 a Florida court ordered him to pay $25m to Faull’s estate in a wrongful death claim. Lord knows how much of that they ever saw.
Crypto flipping
(Whoa)
In the lab just mixing
(Whoa)
The crypto-flipping we’ve already explained. As for the lab mixing… in 2012 the Belize authorities raided a compound owned by McAfee, suspecting it of being a methamphetamine lab. No drugs were found, and McAfee claimed he was not manufacturing meth but experimenting with botanical compounds, specifically mentioning an interest in… bath salts. He was never charged.
You gone see my vision, got hoes shooting at me but they just keep missing
McAfee repeatedly claimed that the Belize or US authorities were out to assassinate him, and even claimed that the murder of Gregory Faull could have been a hit aimed at him. In 2019 McAfee said “If I suicide myself, I didn’t. I was whackd.” Nope, that’s not a typo: McAfee used the opportunity to launch another shitcoin called $WHACKD, and shared an apparent tattoo of the logo on his arm.
There is always another layer to the grift. Needless to say, one of the reasons McAfee’s death in a jail cell has attracted such scrutiny is this tweet.
Second Verse
The second verse, sadly, does not offer such rich pickings as the first, though we still somehow reach a point where McAfee promises to eat his own penis:
Some people think I’m psychotic
I’m riding in something exotic
I got no need for a rubber
I’m whipping up antibiotics
I imagine quite a lot of people thought he was psychotic, and McAfee’s lifestyle obviously included expensive vehicles and fast ladies. The last line refers to McAfee co-founding QuorumEx in Belize in 2010, a company that supposedly developed herbal antibiotics.
I only fuck with the crypto
I got no need for a pocket
I only deal in cryptocurrencies, my good man.
Bitcoin 2020 a millie, a millie
I hope that you bought it
McAfee predicted in 2017 that Bitcoin would reach $1 million in value by the end of 2020. McAfee claimed that, if he was wrong, “I will eat my dick on national television.” He was wrong, and reneged on his promise.
Sittin in the tub got my girl pouring bath salt
Pickin ICOs that’s a mutha fuckin cash vault
Ridin in the Bentley….burning asphalt
Hating on my twitter get a mother fucka black balled
I be living like….
McAfee, McAfee, McAfee
John
Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) are a part of the “pump-and-dump” crypto schemes explained above. McAfee was charged by the SEC in 2020 for fraudulently touting ICOs. The Twitter line just refers to the fact that McAfee was block-happy on the platform..
We then get another go-around of the chorus, but no changes to the lyrics.
Watch On
And… we’re done. All that remains for me to do is recommend the documentary where I first caught a glimpse of this unique cultural production. Running with the Devil: The Wild World of John McAfee can be found on Netflix and is an eye-opening glimpse into the life of a clearly remarkable and deeply intelligent, but crooked and insane man.
Around that core of raw footage, the documentary mixes in other interviews and footage from McAfee’s life, up to and including his death (the film was released in 2022). One of the unexpected stories here is that of cameraman Robert King, who after a long and remarkable career as a war correspondent became director of photography at Vice Media in 2012. Which is why he was chasing a madman around Belize while Vice was simultaneously posting headlines like “We are with John McAfee right now, suckers.”
King has clearly Seen Some Shit and been right in the middle of horrible conflicts, but at times even he’s taken aback by what he’s witnessing, while simultaneously becoming further embroiled with McAfee as… an associate maybe, at times even somewhere near the line of a collaborator. Towards the end of the documentary it does a great job digging into how King feels about this, and he’s a deeply intelligent and articulate individual, someone who is obviously willing to cross lines, and does, but in doing so becomes the story himself: a catastrophic mistake by Vice saw the geodata of a photo of McAfee exposed and, though King and a fellow Vice journalist were blamed by some initially, it later emerged neither were at fault.
