The YSL outcast addresses the elephant in the room on A Gift & a Curse, showing as long as the music delivers he’ll be just fine.
Street politics follow hip hop like your own shadow. It dates back decades to the days of Tupac and Biggie, often leading to imprisonment and death. A sister aspect is snitch culture, the topic of much recent debate since Atlanta rapper Gunna took a plea deal in the ongoing YSL RICO case, which maintains his innocence in the crimes in exchange for community service and admittance that YSL is a gang without further cooperation or taking the stand. Folks far removed from street life have contributed their two cents on the matter. For Gunna, it’s time to get back to the music and see what he has to say.
A Gift & a Curse is no artistic shift, but ticks new boxes in the rapper’s quest to reclaim status.
A Gift & a Curse is well and truly inspired by Gunna’s involvement in the YSL RICO case. It doesn’t lure you in with a false pretence just for image. His last record DS4Ever thrived off its sheer absurdity, packed with your usual trap content and unhinged sexual anecdotes. A Gift & a Curse keeps it mainly PG, allowing Gunna’s raps to be taken seriously for the first time in his career. He raps with a frown, dropping mature observations which aren’t anything revolutionary but do help to paint his mindset since gaining his freedom. When it comes to addressing the actual case, Gunna remains cryptic, for obvious reasons, but makes up for the lack of detail with the appropriate feel.
At a healthy 15 tracks, A Gift & a Curse is choosy with its curation, and doesn’t stick around to have much fun. It is relatively downtempo, creating a sombre mood to hit home its most poignant moments. Make no mistake, Gunna is far from getting experimental here. Matter fact, the production is as familiar as it can get. “Rodeo Dr” could easily fit on WUNNA, as could “Go Crazy” on Drip Season 3 (which oddly samples a smoke alarm that needs its battery changed, purposely or accidentally). The three-track stretch of “Ca$h $hit”, “Fukumean” and “Rodeo Dr” are the only instances of Gunna having his usual fun. This results in an album with two key factors: the production’s on brand, and the content’s aptly on theme.
On A Gift & a Curse, Gunna is on that private island that kicked off his last album, as there’s no guest appearances over the 45 minutes. You can feel the isolation within the album, as if Gunna’s stood wearing boxing gloves with no one in his corner. “IDK Nomore” is the most hopeless Gunna’s ever sound, putting his trust issues and pain for lost friends on a megascreen (“We burned the bridge and cut the ties and we forever apart” / “They lookin’ for me, let em know I’m building a wall”). The sombre tone goes right up to the closer “Alright”, an appropriate ending as Gunna throws in some last-minute optimism. It may be dramatic, but it works.
Most importantly, A Gift & a Curse finds a balance between living in the moment and focusing on shelf life. If Gunna spent the whole album rapping about the RICO case it would become the most dated album in a year’s time. This record shows it can live both inside and outside of legal context and snitch allegations, largely using the comeback single “Bread & Butter” to get the business out the way. He also cannot spill any beans of substance as the case is still ongoing. In the end, we receive little answers that is compensated with plenty emotion.
As law-abiding citizens, we shouldn’t be too concerned with whether Gunna snitched or not. Nor should we let it affect our thoughts on the music. A Gift & a Curse shows that Gunna is YSL’s most valuable asset, constantly honing his sound and this time adding a new layer to his predictable output. Like the closing track states, Gunna will be alright.
7.5 / 10
Best tracks: “Bread & Butter”, “Rodeo Dr”, “Fukumean”, “IDK Nomore”, “Ca$h $hit”, “Back to the Moon”, “Alright”
Mic Cheque 