Robert Matthew Van Winkle was born in Dallas, Texas, on October 31, 1967. Van Winkle has never known his biological father; he was given the family name of the Dutch man his mother was married to at the time of his birth. When Van Winkle was four, his mother divorced. Afterward, he grew up moving between Dallas and Miami, where his new stepfather worked at a car dealership.

As of the late 2000s, Ice's live performances feature a mix of newer, rock and techno-influenced material and old-school hip hop. Ice performs with a live drummer and DJ, and sometimes sprays his audience with bottled water. Ice's performances often feature an inflatable grim reaper balloon, a dancer in a clown mask, and confetti thrown into the audience. Describing his performances, Ice stated "It's high energy, stage diving, pyrotechnics, girls showing their breasts. It's crazy party atmosphere." Ice stated that his musical style was influenced by underground music, rather than mainstream music, and that his influences included hip hop and funk artists such as Funkadelic, Rick James, Roger Troutman, Egyptian Lover and Parliament. Ice is a big fan of 50's and 60's reggae and Bob Marley's work and has also stated that he enjoys Rage Against the Machine, Slipknot, and System of a Down. Ice sometimes plays bass, drums and keyboards on studio recordings. Vanilla Ice referred to his mainstream music as "above-ground" rather than underground, as he tried to make danceable beats and removed expletives so that the songs could reach a wider audience. A lot of his early hits had Ice boasting sexual conquests, in 1991, Ice was quoted "I rap about what I know. Girls and stuff. That's what is going through my head." When asked about his darker sound in 2002, Ice replied; "Music is about reflection and I'm just reflecting my life and everything it's been and there's no way I'm going to be able to stress what I want and mean over a break beat, you know, it's too emotional and it's too intense, so you have to have the intensity of the band, it's like a symphony, you know, you have to build on the intense parts, and so it just wasn't going to happen, to come extreme over some hip hop record, so to exorcise my demons I had to have the band."

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