Westside Gunn’s hustle raps embrace each the true and absurd : NPR

Have you ever ever cooked half a brick in an air fryer? The query, posed by the Buffalo rapper Westside Gunn on the music “Michael Irvin,” from his 2019 mixtape Flygod Is an Superior God 2, is only one of many such hypotheticals scattered throughout his discography. Gunn is a hip-hop embellisher if ever there was one, who delights in turning majestic soul beats into canvases for his ostentatious depictions of go-getter life. A shrill and exasperated presence on mic, he represents a bars-first number of rap that revels in extremity as a window into an identifiable but distant expertise. The logical response to the “Michael Irvin” bar is, “What?” Why would somebody even ask that? However embedded in his query is a deeper reply, a quiet perception about rap’s relationship with accuracy.

Recently on social media, it has been on development to level out the inaccessibility of Westside Gunn’s claims to the on a regular basis listener. In TikTok movies and X posts, customers current themselves as jokingly baffled on the notion of air-fried dope, discovering a distinct segment neighborhood in how far the world of Gunn’s songs feels from their very own. “When Westside Gunn says ‘you ever?’ the reply is at all times no not as soon as in my total life have I finished that,” reads one, whereas one other imagines a confession-based social gathering recreation with Gunn and Kendrick Lamar as utterly unwinnable. It is not that the situations are far-fetched; they’re absurd in a approach that’s gorgeous, declared so matter-of-factly as if to be apparent. The juxtaposition of one thing unreasonable offered as routine creates a satisfying cognitive dissonance. “You ever shot anyone you like ‘trigger they violated?” Gunn asks on “It is Doable,” earlier than pushing issues even additional: “Pistol in your mouth like a Now and Later.” Within the tossed-off rhetoricals he presents, and the plain reply — no — you may hear a counterpoint to devoted interpretations of avenue rap that deal with lyrics as gospel and never efficiency. That does not essentially imply they don’t seem to be actual, merely that they don’t seem to be conditional.

Gunn and the cohorts of his unbiased Griselda label are hustler rappers, a lineage established by New Yorkers like Biggie, Jay-Z and Ghostface Killah and revitalized within the 2010s by Roc Marciano. Within the latter’s wake, newer disciples have leaned extra closely into exaggeration, just like the newbie wrestler and culinarian Motion Bronson, who took issues in an nearly whimsical path. However, rappers like Rick Ross and 2 Chainz have turned hustle into sport, divorcing it from its stark, lunch-pail connotations — Ross by enjoying up extravagance whereas blurring the significance of backstory, 2 Chainz by reeling off flex after flex as giddy punchlines. Over time, the characters have grown extra outlandish, the boasts extra excessive and unbelievable. Gunn is the ultimate type of this thought experiment: gritty, lavish and impractical .

The author Zito Madu made a case for dubbing the pressure from which Gunn comes “surreal rap,” noting its distance from the swaggering of somebody like Jay-Z. “Surreal rap does not even attempt to get near actuality. The purpose is to go so exterior what’s plausible and are available to a brand new place that the ridiculousness of it’s what’s thrilling.” Gunn would probably disagree to some extent. “Wealthy off drug dealin’ truly,” he raps on the latest “Outlander,” from his Valentine’s Day launch, 12. It is protected to say that for him and people of his ilk, what’s plausible and what’s ridiculous aren’t mutually unique, and that current in that gray space challenges a binary mind-set about hip-hop authenticity. Gunn’s avenue CV is well-documented. His raps aren’t a world away from actuality. However in addition they, prudently, aren’t beholden to it. So when he raps, “You ever robbed 10 bricks and bought 10 bricks all in a day?”, at the least half the purpose is that you have not, which nudges the listener towards a touchier query: What sort of particular person experiences one thing like that?

There’s a temptation to consider authenticity as equal to autobiography. Outdoors of the courts, the place lyrics have generally been positioned as confessions of precise felony acts, rap followers have usually lionized “realness” as the nice differentiator between the true hood griots and the pretenders. It’s a part of the enchantment of a rapper just like the late King Von, whose verses web sleuths spent years attempting to hook up with precise violence he allegedly perpetrated, or Lil Durk, who, after being embroiled in a murder-for-hire scheme in retaliation for Von’s dying final yr, is now seeing his lyrics weaponized in an identical approach. Setting apart the clearly sinister precedent of treating lyrics as proof, there isn’t any denying that proximity to floor stage is a part of the draw with a variety of hip-hop. Avenue cred is meant to lend the music gravity and urgency, including the heightened sensations of recollection. The factor misplaced in translation is that reminiscence — be it of a factor you have seen or finished — could be a jumping-off level for invention. One thing will be each not actual and legitimate, imagined however sincere.

Most rap is surreal in some sense, always enjoying with incongruity in numerous methods, and hustler rappers specifically have realized to make even probably the most mundane and disturbing interactions appear extraordinary. (I nonetheless take into consideration the Jersey rapper RetcH describing a fiend experiencing a crack excessive as “human origami.”) A few of that’s out of necessity — perspective is likely one of the keys to differentiating one hustle from all of the others — however it’s extra broadly a foundation for bringing aptitude to scenes of insidious circumstances, reworking them into one thing flamboyant. Because of this, these scenes aren’t restricted by actuality, which might constrict the interpretations they permit.

Gunn’s work will be seen as a convincing argument towards taking lyrics at face worth. Although rap could be a lens into what is occurring on the streets, as each the information of the ghetto and first-person journaling, it’s artwork first, perspective-driven however story-forward. These tales will be primarily based on lived expertise with out aspiring to historic accuracy. The ability within the music made by Gunn and his contemporaries is its capability to check the connection between what’s actual and what’s true, in an excessive sufficient approach as to unsettle the listener. His songs are offered as nonfictional dramatic monologues, and but it’s arduous to think about them ever getting used successfully towards him in courtroom. They appear to happen in a reproduction of our world, one barely askew. It does not damage that he sounds a bit like a comic-book supervillain: His rapping voice is someplace within the ballpark of Tommy DeVito off a helium tank, and he rattles off onomatopoeia ad-libs like a one-man results staff. Every verse each affirms his previous and conceptualizes his current.

Some traces are believable however farcical. “I roll your physique in a Murakami rug.” “Cobra clutch, even my clone wore Dior for months.” “My shooter hopped out the Flying Spur in a hijab.” The purpose isn’t realism or surrealism; it is tragicomedy, not essentially irrational or paradoxical however so zany as to be a bit off someway. Different lyrics are particularly about creating an phantasm. There may be, in fact, tried and true rap mafioso hyperbole: On Nonetheless Praying‘s “Beef Bar,” he is doing drive-bys out the Jag with vendor tags, vacuum sealing dope in villas, flying on a jet ski in Athens, Greece. In such instances, it is the magnitude of all of it that feels preposterous, promoting credibility itself as fantasy. However then there are bars that exist just for coloration, to warp a well-recognized, darkish scenario in order that it is recognizable however uncommon. “Fiend mentioned I appear to be Dr. Sebi when he shot up.” “I finished fell asleep, head on a triple beam.” “Bullets really feel like a pinball machine inside you.” They learn like jokes, however that is sort of the purpose. You already know what they are saying lies inside these.

Which brings us again to the query at hand: Have you ever ever cooked half a brick in an air fryer? The factor that works about it’s that it may occur — but in addition, why wouldn’t it? There are layers of nuance at play: Beneath the plain absurdity and strangeness of the problem is the battle prerequisite to creating such a call. The query is as grim as it’s foolish, marking each a desperation and an ingenuity that speaks not simply to Gunn himself as a personality however the hustler’s spirit. It is the actual cocktail of harebrained and extreme, real and mind-boggling, that forces you to see dope dealing in much less absolute phrases. You may most likely by no means cook dinner half a brick in an air fryer, and perhaps Westside Gunn hasn’t both, however what issues is the chance.