letz talk abt gucci mane

i'm not gonna piss on yall's parade anymore.

like u would recognize our 'ready to die' if we had one

i'd kind of like one tbh

the nature of the music industry, the rap game, pop music, etc are all so radically different now. never mind music itself & which influences have come to the forefront of popular rap

a new 'ready for die' is gonna be, by nature, entirely different from ready to die

this is sort of the problem ive had w/ gibbs & pill praise at some level is its all felt very invested in replicating something that has already existed & is part of why weve made a big deal about gucci around here is he feels like a refreshingly new blueprint

That makes total sense! However, I think the problem I've had--and dat fool Shiplo agrees to some extent--is that I don't exactly see Gucci as a new musical blueprint of anything. That could just be old man whiney talkin tho

yeah i more or less agree w him and def came to similar conclusions when "worst enemy" first leaked, i still think the R&B jams are really good although I probably agree that lumping them all together in the middle wasnt the greatest context for ppl

― unicorn strapped with a unabomb (deej), Monday, December 7, 2009 7:10 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

otm. seriously what the fuck is up with the pacing on this album? all of his mixtapes i've heard do such a great job of starting things off with epic, ascending synth hurricanes that get you ridiculously excited, while this starts with "guuuucci, gu-u-ucci" and then a skit, then gets drowned in r&b just when it starts to gain momentum.

im writing something right now that explains why what hes doing feels fresh (altho ive definitely mentioned aspects of it before on ilx & in the first piece i wrote on smshrimp) but for now i just think its worth pointing out that prior to him actually getting any press whatsoever i thought that he was doing something musically different from plies/gotti/similar rappers in the same vein, & i feel like his current popularity bears that out, that there is a musical basis for his bumrush of the pop charts this year

burrrrush

this is sort of the problem ive had w/ gibbs & pill praise at some level is its all felt very invested in replicating something that has already existed & is part of why weve made a big deal about gucci around here is he feels like a refreshingly new blueprint

― unicorn strapped with a unabomb (deej), Monday, December 7, 2009 8:20 PM (19 minutes ago)

and this is the problem i have w/ u always tryna contextaulize really good rappers like these dudes and getting all mad when they get the blogger love that your favorite artist doesnt get (yet). let good rappers be good rappers sometimes imo

i mean i 100% get what you're saying but the fact that they draw on different, more classical influences than yr guccis doesnt mean they're any less skilled

kinda dreading gucci's blog darling phase, personally

uh

its never been about my 'favorite artist' k3v its about hundreds of other artists

which reminds me RIYL pill, freddie gibbs, playboy tre

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_L44f1agGlTA/SxxDxG4migI/AAAAAAAABh8/n-uIFiGwXv8/s400/big_k.r.i.t.jpg
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_L44f1agGlTA/SxxDwyuftFI/AAAAAAAABh0/yoxG6p3m-P4/s400/big_k.r.i.tback_copy.jpg

i like this more than the playboy tre record, more than pill, less than freddie gibbs

i mean i 100% get what you're saying but the fact that they draw on different, more classical influences than yr guccis doesnt mean they're any less skilled

― k3vin k., Monday, December 7, 2009 7:45 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

its not about 'skill' its about honest, accurate criticism.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wB5o2J9YL-0

otm. seriously what the fuck is up with the pacing on this album? all of his mixtapes i've heard do such a great job of starting things off with epic, ascending synth hurricanes that get you ridiculously excited, while this starts with "guuuucci, gu-u-ucci" and then a skit, then gets drowned in r&b just when it starts to gain momentum.

― brooklyn we go ham (samosa gibreel), Monday, December 7, 2009 8:26 PM (18 minutes ago)

i find the r&b middle to be annoying too (tho i'm with deej in that i don't find any of them really skippable besides "spotlight"), but i love the way the album opens up. it's such a statement track for gucci, and the "dramatic" (for lack of a better word i guess) entrance was kinda an unaviodable way to go - dude's been dropping enough mixtapes now that it was obvious his first album in a minute was gonna have an ALBUM OPENER

kinda dreading gucci's blog darling phase, personally

― brooklyn we go ham (samosa gibreel), Monday, December 7, 2009 7:45 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

uh

― justin timberlane (Whiney G. Weingarten), Monday, December 7, 2009 7:47 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

if u think posts by me noz & s0derberg are, like, 'gucci's blog darling phase' yr kidding yourself ... in the blogs hes totally more an 'enemy' at the moment. wait til the diplo project comes out, tho ... & now that hes got an album??

yeah i mean...compared to the total saturation blogger obsessions w/ wayne or dipset at their peaks, gucci is really still a pretty minor niche.

its not about 'skill' its about honest, accurate criticism.

― unicorn strapped with a unabomb (deej), Monday, December 7, 2009 8:49 PM (2 minutes ago)

i can't speak for you obv but i just get the feeling you'd like them a lot more in a vacuum than if they were constantly being compared to other rappers doing different things - from what ive gathered your gripes are mainly "they're good and all but why isn't [this rapper representing this trend i'd rather see blow up] getting all the love?"

i mean be glad it's these dudes and not asher/drake/etc 08

but k3v there is no artist who i think deserves that much attention right now -- its more that i think the crit world feels really disconnected from a wider rap community, the kind that would probably also appreciate Gibbs if they heard him, but also wouldnt throw out their (for example) Gotti CDs in the exchange.

i mean obviously id rather it was these dudes than asher but i almost feel like thats a kind of weird allegiance in some ways -- especially when it comes to tracks that are sorta morally questionable like freddie gibbs pimping tracks. i mean u got a guy like too short releasing pimp raps with a groundbreaking & really strong style, or suga free, or whoever & its like -- well yah im not really on board w/ smacking hoes around but this dude is, love him or hate him, doing something different & *important*. that feels like honest criticism to me. But putting these dudes on a pedestal is devaluing 'style' as an attribute of what-makes-rap-work in favor of function

i mean its not that i think big k.r.i.t. should be up there either -- its more like, check out this 2nd tier of dope promising rappers -- i wonder which of them has the strongest future? & then analyzing what works & doesnt about their raps. but new yorker coverage for one of them feels like hes jumping his spot in line or something

if u think posts by me noz & s0derberg are, like, 'gucci's blog darling phase' yr kidding yourself ... in the blogs hes totally more an 'enemy' at the moment. wait til the diplo project comes out, tho ... & now that hes got an album??

― unicorn strapped with a unabomb (deej), Monday, December 7, 2009 8:52 PM (30 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Oh no I know. I mean, i'm just saying we're kind of already at gucci level orange but gucci level red is def on the horizon.

i can't wait for the indie rock blogs to pick up on this and write about it in the embarrassing and hilarious ways they talked about Wayne/Dipset

yeah al & i (or maybe jordan & i?) were talking about how this record is more like gucci's "carter II" than his carter3, that the crossover wasnt coming as quickly as we expected

i can't wait for the indie rock blogs to pick up on this and write about it in the embarrassing and hilarious ways they talked about Wayne/Dipset

― justin timberlane (Whiney G. Weingarten), Monday, December 7, 2009 9:26 PM (16 minutes ago)

and it's likely that that'll be when most people start taking him seriously.

"Stupid Wild" sounds like "You Don't Want Drama"

http://www.thefader.com/2009/12/08/gucci-mane-dangers-not-a-stranger-diplo-remix-mp3/

so much hate

http://www.jpberlin.de/j.kowal/photos/people/bushtears.jpg

you know i honestly think gucci is going to be at maybe Young Jeezy levels when it comes to indie rock blogs. I don't think he's gonna be at Wayne/Dipset capacity because a huge part of their success with indie rockers comes from white dudes who liked to think they were part retarded.

http://maddecent.com/blog/2009/12/07/diplo-leak-from-free-gucci-mixtape/

that fucker co-opted the shirt like he does everything else

mother fucker ruined it

you know i honestly think gucci is going to be at maybe Young Jeezy levels when it comes to indie rock blogs. I don't think he's gonna be at Wayne/Dipset capacity because a huge part of their success with indie rockers comes from white dudes who liked to think they were part retarded.

― justin timberlane (Whiney G. Weingarten), Tuesday, December 8, 2009 10:30 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

there's already been a lot of "lol so the joke is that this guy is actually retarded right?" shit w/ Gucci though

Diplo: 1
surfboad dudes get wiped out, totally: 0

liking Big Krit! thanks deej : )

no prob whiney!! i like the obvious T.I. influence in his raps

i meant m@tt. totally didnt mean to confuse u w/ whiney o_O

big krit more like bait crit

hey i'm not a rock critic! i'm something even worse!

"The State vs. Radric Davis" likely won't be nominated for a Grammy, but it would be tough to find a truer, more communal swatch of pop music released this year.

Chris Richards (from Q and Not U and now the Washington Post music critic) weighs in--http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/07/AR2009120703987.html

But unlike Wayne, Gucci consistently puts quantity over quality

right

hey i really dig the first q and not u record!

But unlike Wayne, Gucci consistently puts quantity over quality

right

― david cam'ron (tpp), Tuesday, December 8, 2009 2:57 PM (2 minutes ago)

yeah idk what he even means by that, a paragraph up he's calling him "reliable"

good review tho

yall are famous

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/music/archives/2009/12/free_gucci_fuck.php#more

surfboards 1
diplo 1

AHAHAHAAH!!! dude screen shot my gmail onto the VV!!

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/music/archives/2009/12/free_gucci_fuck.php

dammit
http://blogs.villagevoice.com/music/assets_c/2009/12/email-thumb-575x346.jpg

lol'd at "survey says...that's a lie" so much the first time i opened that e-mail