Gunna: Drip or Drown 2 reviews – Atlantan justified, plangent justifies the hype | The music

AAfter having released a series of underground mixtapes and fed on Young Thug, rapper Gunna, 25, was selected by Mariah Carey, Travis Scott and Future as a guest guest in 2018, and joined the Top 5 American via one of his collaborations with fellow Atlantan Lil Baby: the Drip To Hard Hard, beautifully melancholy. He enters in 2019 as one of the most coveted MCs of the United States, and this first solo album – thoughtful, touching and discreetly proud – justifies the hype.

The influence of Young Thug is certainly clear: although Gunna does not have the same thirsty vocal idiosyncrasies, he shares his rather inconsolable attitude. If you read the lyrics themselves, you would have the impression of triumphing like a transformed pop rapper: it's a call to success, including a never-ending stream of strangers, extending the rapper's bad for no American cars that must have the marketing department of General Motors covered with worried post-it. But delivered in this plaintive tone, he suggests a man be dismayed by the spiritual emptiness of his new wealth, or be damaged by the struggles that preceded him. "Sometimes a gangsta needs a hug," he admits in Who You Foolin '; "We are locked in the ghetto forever," says Lil Baby about Derek Fisher, although he feasted on diamonds and cars early in his guest verse.

These pieces come in the style of Atlanta, consisting of simple melodies obsessively repeated, whose seductive monotony reinforces the meaning of a quest for disastrous meaning. Gunna deploys another Atlantan innovation, Migos ad-libs, where the last word of each line is insistently repeated, but gives it a powerful effect. He extends the ad-libs and covers them, letting them slip into the next bar: the effect, as on the nominative track Nominal Outstanding, is a series of impressionistic words, even more blurred with his stained saying. Gunna is known for defending the term slang "drip" to describe his ever-elegant garms. its delivery is perfectly in keeping with the aquatic metaphor.

The production of Wheezy and Turbo the Great is exceptional. She adds a touch of delicate string, like a koto or a guitar echoing the sound of Arthur Russell's cello, to the vast trap architecture. The result is a sweet and easy record: the perfect rap album for a bruised America.