It’s said that art mirrors life. In hip-hop’s case, there’s always been a deliberate entanglement of perception and reality. Fans demand their MCs be real…but never too real. Successful hip-hop is about the hint of the danger, the tease of it, the mystique. Hip-hop is about balance.
Gucci Mane is an artist striving for that balance, volatility versus musicality. Controversy, including a feud with former collaborator Young Jeezy, has grabbed the headlines, with insufficient regard paid to his considerable mic skills, raw talent, and business acumen. Gucci is looking to wrest his name from public speculation and let his own words do the talking.
“I wish everybody well who’s making money in this rap game,” the Atlanta-raised rapper says, dismissing the controversy that followed him in the past. “My own rap game is going so good, I’ve got so many things on my plate at my label, that I don’t got time for other people’s business.” With a deal with Asylum Records as the boss of his own label, So Icey Entertainment, Gucci does indeed have a full schedule with no time to dwell on the past.
“I live my life with no regrets. I just wish that a lot of things never happened, but anybody can wish,” says Gucci. Sounds like a man with his eyes on the prize. And you’d expect nothing less from an artist who ground his way to the top via the hustle of independent records. Signing to Big Cat Records in the wake of his local single “Black Tee,” he dropped his debut record, Trap House, in May 2005. The independent album moved an impressive 140,000 units, largely on the strength of the “Icy” single, featuring Jeezy. Clamor over song rights sparked dispute, and the resulting rift grew.
Controversy notwithstanding, Mane’s independence was cemented: “I was on the independent scene for about two years,” he recalls. “It’s crazy! You gotta go into your own pocket to support your craft. You need other avenues to have money coming in, to support your stuff. You might win, you might lose, and it’s a gamble out there with the independent circuit. One thing you’d better have is good music because without that, you go downhill fast in the independent game.”
Good music firmly in hand, Gucci was fast approaching stardom when more tragedy befell him. But let’s backtrack; how did the man born Radric Davis in Bessemer, Alabama, become Gucci Mane, mouthpiece for Atlanta stuntin’? Mane remembers little from his time in Alabama, just that it was rural, and that it’s changed dramatically since he left at the age of nine. “I gotta shout out Alabama though, because they holdin’ it down,” he affirms. “Every time I go there to do a show, I’m impressed with how hip-hop culture has taken root.”
Mane’s identity coalesced when he moved with his mother to Atlanta. “I lived all of my adolescent and adult life in Atlanta,” he explains. “I’m from East Atlanta Zone Six; it was hard, man, it was real rough. I grew up in the Starter jacket era: they’d take your Starter jacket, your 8Ball jacket, they’d take your hat, your shoes. It was just no holds barred on the streets, dog eat dog. If you missed the bus, you had to be crewed up or you’d get jumped. It was wild when I came up.”
It’s a bleak portrait. When asked to describe his home life more vividly, Mane offers a look into his contemplative side, a side honed as a schoolyard poet. “I was just a young dude in a single parent house most of my life. I can’t complain that much. I would guess it’s like any black child growing up in a single parent household. There are a lot of people who know how that is. I didn’t have a lot coming up; but what I did have, I appreciated. I was blessed to have a caring mother to raise me right and to help me with my business ventures; she’s been there through the whole struggle. There’s a lot that goes along with that; it made me who I am today.”
A stepfather would enter the picture during Mane’s adolescence, introducing not only a male figure, but also inspiration for Mane’s unusual moniker. “My father came in, the original Gucci Mane; that’s what people in the neighborhood called him, and that’s where I get my name from. From then on, I grew up the son of a hustler and a schoolteacher; it was the best of both worlds because I was educated twice.” Drawing inspiration from a pantheon of rappers before him –Big Daddy Kane, LL Cool J, Ice Cube, the Beastie Boys, N.W.A—Mane went on to release Trap House, a lethal brew of his signature sound: “I call my music straight Gucci: going hard and whatever beats you make you for me, if I’m feeling it, if I’m rocking with it, I’m gonna crush it. When you hear me, you hear a lot of pain, a lot of hood; you hear what’s going on in the inner city in Atlanta.”
Unfortunately, Trap House was ill timed; the month of its release, Gucci was accused of murder and jailed for two days. Eventually deemed to be acting in self-defense, and without sufficient evidence to hold him, Mane was exonerated. But the ordeal left an indelible imprint on the man. “I learned to keep better company, watch where I go, and be mindful of my surroundings at all times,” he reveals. “Watch what I say, watch what I do and how I do it, just keep myself out of the wrong crowd.”
“I always stand up man,” he continues. “I’m one of the toughest guys I know. It’ll take a lot more than that to break me down.” Undeterred, Mane was back in the studio, preparing 2006’s eerily apropos Hard To Kill. The buzz from Hard To Kill vaulted Gucci Mane from regional commodity to national treasure, and major labels responded accordingly: “There was a bidding war going on, and I liked Atlantic’s approach. They made it known that they wanted me, they felt where I was going and that I could grow with them.”
Asylum/Atlantic Records welcomed Gucci Mane in early ’07, granting him his own imprint, So Icey Entertainment. With it comes an entire stable of artists, the So Icey Boyz. As the Boyz ready for their own exposure –“I got them in training; they be in the weight room, pumping iron, doing pushups, shopping at the mall, buying ice”—Gucci is focused on his magnum opus, Back to the Trap House. “I started working on the album, and by the third song, I was like ‘This is going back to the Trap House.’ I started feeling the same way I did when I made my first album. It had the same feel to it, the same freshness. And I had the same hunger and desire I had when I first started rapping.”
“Since I went major, I want everybody to know I’m still keeping it street, keeping it hood,” Gucci maintains. “I’m trying to take it back to all my fans that I had when I first started my career. And at the same time, I’m trying to open up my new album to a new fan base. So it’s a mix for everybody coming together, like my first album was.” Gucci has always prided himself on his innate ability, and his refusal to let guest appearances dictate the tone of his records. “I just want people to know I’m a great songwriter, man,” he asserts. “I’m passionate about what I do, and it’s choreographed strategically when I do it. I bring a lot of experience, creative wordplay, and a crazy style. And my albums, I record most of the songs without writing them down; it’s a God-given gift and I just get paid for it. It come from God, it’s like wondering what makes a bird fly. He made me a poet like the great poets of the past.”
But don’t mistake Gucci’s confidence for self-absorption. The vicissitudes of his career have dictated a longer view. Lyrics aside, he’s less preoccupied with visible means and more so with acting as an emissary from his under-repped block. “I’m not the one to glorify what goes on in the hood,” he insists. “We have everything there, the whole range from violence to people getting on the bus and going to work. There’s a lot more to the hood than just drugs. It’s a bigger story, there’s a big picture. I went to school in that neighborhood, I worked there, I trapped there, I hustled there, and I got my name there. I’m proud to be from East Atlanta Zone Six, and I claim there. I hold that on my back and carry that, to be the first one from there to really rock.”
And Gucci’s professional aims have matured as well. While other rappers stress platinum plaques, Gucci hasn’t forgotten the route he took to stardom. “I made a lot of CDs on my own. People fucked with me and supported me, and just made me the man I am today. That’s my blueprint right there, and I stay mindful of it. So now, my only concern is that people feel my music; at the end of the day, I do it for people to feel it. If one person feel it, two people feel it, I feel like my job’s been done.”
Fortunately for Gucci, he should be prepared to welcome an army of new fans with Back to the Trap House. But longstanding fans shouldn’t fear; they’ll recognize “Freaky Gurl,” reprised from its previous appearance from Hard To Kill. Luda, upon hearing the joint, asked for a guest spot on the remix. Said remix now appears as the lead single on Back to the Trap House, following in Gucci’s theme of mating old and new. Over a bouncing, meandering beat from Cyber Sapp, the two cook up the requisite concoction of whips, chips, and chicks. Also look out for “Bird Flu,” the album’s number two single, laced by New-York based Supa Sonics. Elsewhere, firm guest verses from Rich Boy and Pimp C of UGK round out Gucci’s regional flavor, while Bay-area producer Zaytoven (of “Icy” renown) locks down Gucci’s West Coast appeal.
Gucci Mane has something for everyone, and with the struggles of the past in his rearview, Gucci is settled in for his ride to the top. “I’m best known for controversy but I’m trying to gain respect as a songwriter and entertainer. I plan to hit them so hard with this album; who knows what the future will bring. I’ll be banging them out till I can’t bang no more.”
Double
Gucci Mane Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
C-NOTE!
R.I.P. to Michael Jackson - Go on girl!
Beat It! (Beat It! Beat It!)
My bitch got a bitch, I'm seeing double (double)
Them bitches in double trouble (double)
(Hook)
I said double, double-double, double-double nigga
Double, double-double, double-double nigga
I fuck these freaks with double rubbers
I'm a lean drinker, I double cup 'em (lean, lean, lean!)
Double (double)
Double, double-double - yah!
Double, double, double
They wanna shoot me j-just like double
But I'm a gun tottin' motherfucka'
Double, double, double, d-d-d-double (double) double
(Verse 1)
I got a charger in my charger so it's fucking double
Cost me a 60, put 60 more, now I'm burning rubber
I got Flintstones around my rollie face like Barney Rubble
These ho's so freaky, when I get head I wear double rubbers
These nigga's so sneaky, keep two forty Glocks, I double tuck 'em
They wanna shoot at me like Double-D, but they in trouble
Ay, see, your boyfriend is a lame, he's a double duck
I got his money plus my money, I got double bucks (Waka Money)
Tooly truck and Holman trucks, I double truck
64 Scagli, yea that 4-58 Ferrari bitch, I double stunt
My girlfriend got her girlfriend sucking my balls, they getting them double nuts
Your baby daddy broke and messy as hell, he got that double must
Every time I see Keyshia Ka'oir Instagram man I double lust
Me and my main bitch stunt so hard we need to drop a double diss
(Hook)
My bitch got a bitch, I'm seeing double (double)
Them bitches in double trouble (double)
(x2)
I said double, double-double, double-double nigga
Double, double-double, double-double nigga
I fuck these freaks with double rubbers
I'm a lean drinker, I double cup 'em (lean, lean, lean!)
Double (double)
Double, double-double - yah!
Double, double, double
They wanna shoot me j-just like double
But I'm a gun tottin' motherfucka'
Double, double, double, d-d-d-double (double) double
I got a charger in my charger so it's fucking double
Cost me a 60, put 60 more, now I'm burning rubber
(Outro: ??)
Gon' ball out on these boys man
Ya'll already know what it is man
Ya'll understand, Ten Seventeen, American Dream
Ya'll know what it is, turn up, don't turn down
In Gucci Mane's song "Double," he brags about his wealth, his lifestyle, and his women. Throughout the song, Gucci Mane repeats the phrase "double," emphasizing his abundance of everything. He even states that he sees double because his girlfriend has a girlfriend. The line "My bitch got a bitch, I'm seeing double" shows that he has a lot of women and is not ashamed of it. Gucci Mane also mentions driving a double-charged car, which shows that he has a lot of money to spend.
Gucci Mane's lyrics are explicit and boastful, showing his love for material objects and women. He mentions that he has "double rubbers" while having sex, indicating that he is taking precautions while enjoying his wild lifestyle. The line "I'm a lean drinker, I double cup 'em" shows that he drinks lean, a popular concoction of cough syrup and soda, in a double cup to show off his wealth.
The chorus emphasizes the phrase "double," and it is repeated frequently throughout the song. This repetition symbolizes Gucci Mane's preoccupation with excess, and it is a common theme throughout his music. The outro is a typical rapper's plug, where Gucci Mane mentions his record label and associates.
Line by Line Meaning
C-NOTE!
Introducing C-NOTE as the producer of the song.
R.I.P. to Michael Jackson - Go on girl!
Paying respects to Michael Jackson and telling the listener to keep going and enjoying the song.
Beat It! (Beat It! Beat It!)
Referencing Michael Jackson's hit song, 'Beat It', and using it as a musical interlude.
My bitch got a bitch, I'm seeing double (double)
Explaining that Gucci Mane's partner has a female companion, which means he has twice the fun and double the trouble.
Them bitches in double trouble (double)
Saying that dealing with two women can be twice the problem.
I said double, double-double, double-double nigga
Repeating the word 'double' to emphasize its importance.
I fuck these freaks with double rubbers
Stating that Gucci Mane takes safety seriously and uses two condoms at once during sexual activities.
I'm a lean drinker, I double cup 'em (lean, lean, lean!)
Gucci Mane reveals that he mixes prescription cough medicine with soda and drinks it using two cups at once.
They wanna shoot me j-just like double
Acknowledging that people are after him and plan on shooting him twice.
But I'm a gun tottin' motherfucka'
Asserting that he carries a firearm and is ready to defend himself.
I got a charger in my charger so it's fucking double
Talking about his Dodge Charger that has another Charger inside it, which doubles its awesomeness.
Cost me a 60, put 60 more, now I'm burning rubber
Took a car that cost him $60,000 and added $60,000 of modifications to it, making it fast enough to spin its wheels when he accelerates.
These ho's so freaky, when I get head I wear double rubbers
Admitting that the women he has sex with are so sexually active that he wears two condoms to be extra safe.
These nigga's so sneaky, keep two forty Glocks, I double tuck 'em
Saying that he carries two guns (with the ability to hold 15 rounds each) and hides them in a way that they can't be seen.
Ay, see, your boyfriend is a lame, he's a double duck
Pointing out that someone's boyfriend is uninteresting and unimportant.
I got his money plus my money, I got double bucks (Waka Money)
Getting money from his own work and from others, he has twice the amount of money.
Tooly truck and Holman trucks, I double truck
Explaining that he has two types of big trucks which look alike.
64 Scagli, yea that 4-58 Ferrari bitch, I double stunt
Refers to his two cars, a 1964 Chevrolet Impala and a Ferrari 458 Italia, and saying he double shows them off.
My girlfriend got her girlfriend sucking my balls, they getting them double nuts
Expressing that both his girlfriend and her girlfriend perform oral sex on him and he has an orgasm twice the size.
Your baby daddy broke and messy as hell, he got that double must
Saying that someone's child's father is poor and unkempt, and he has a beard that looks like the hair on an untrimmed horse's hooves.
Every time I see Keyshia Ka'oir Instagram man I double lust
Stating that he finds Keyshia Ka'oir attractive and is reminded of that when he sees her on Instagram.
Me and my main bitch stunt so hard we need to drop a double diss
Saying that he and his girlfriend show off so much that they need two diss tracks to cover it all.
Gon' ball out on these boys man
Going to have a good time and make a lot of money.
Ya'll already know what it is man
Assuming that the fans are familiar with his style and what to expect from him.
Ya'll understand, Ten Seventeen, American Dream
Making a reference to his record label, 1017 Records, and his dream of achieving success in America.
Turn up, don't turn down
Encouraging the fans to enjoy the music and get hyped without stopping.
Contributed by Nathan F. Suggest a correction in the comments below.
Stubbo242
Gucci is a legend!! His music does not get played out. You can forget it then bump it years later and it bumps like it's bran new. Proud Gucci fan
Ro68 🦍
On ME!
Shawn Edmond
On Me Yes Sir
sid austo
Could not have said it better myself
Everything Entertainment
@sid austo we have good fucking taste
Matt Gs
Facts
Rhenaldo Barnard
This beat is 🔥🔥🔥
Shawn Edmond
Yes Sir
Ontayy Ri'Cardo
C Note 🔥😎
yee
Only real Gucci fans know about this classic 💯👌🏽