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.”
Top In The Trash
Gucci Mane Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Well, I'm blowin' kush, endorsin' it
For those that ain't as fortunate
I work my fork, I work my wrist
Got babies like the orphanage
Got cabbage like a cabbage patch
Got collard greens and turnips, bitch
I'm always in a foreign whip
My trap boomin' like Bloomingdale's
A long line like you at the Ritz
Got bank like Lloyd, Yayo like Tony
But won't give you 50 cent
Red rubies on my Rolex bezel
It look like I slit my wrist
White diamonds like I'm Liberace
Bitch, come here and kiss my fist
I use Cristal for Listerine
I brush my teeth with purp codeine
I wash my face with bottled water
Drink champagne straight out the bottle
All my whips got superchargers
All my hoes are supermodels
He go hard but I go harder
He faker than Harry Potter
He try to turn up with two hundred ones
He's makin' me laugh
I drink my champagne out the bottle, nigga
I don't fuck with no glass
So many gualas in my pants, nigga
It's makin' me sag
And when I leave up out the lot, nigga
Top in the trash
So much money in my safe
I don't think that I can close it
So much money in my jeans
I don't think that I can tote it
Had a good day
And then I went and bought a Rollie
Shorty brain me so crazy
Had to tell the girl to hold it
Got a college girl, just spoken words
She think that she a poet
When I smash the girl, just spoken words
I have to keep her focused
'Bout to put me out the buildin'
Cause I got some nosy neighbors
Say I'm smokin' loud and they complainin'
'Bout the noise and fragrance
Think I'm going through a phase
Cause my verses are amazing
Think I'm walking through a maze
When I'm walking through the station
Drawing pictures with my words
While these other niggas tracin'
Walking back and forth pacing
Like my girl gon' have a baby
He try to turn up with two hundred ones
He's makin' me laugh
I drink my champagne out the bottle, nigga
I don't fuck with no glass
So many gualas in my pants, nigga
It's makin' me sag
And when I leave up out the lot, nigga
Top in the trash
When I pull up to the lot, aye
All the hoes gon' drop, aye
Like look at his watch, aye
Like look at his car
Look at his earrings
Look at his his bling bling, aye
That nigga stuntin', just damn near killed the scene
Make bitches scream and faint, aye
I just poured me up a pint of that purple
I don’t like red
You want to fight bitch, you might be dead, aye
Red white chalk, some niggas in the rear with black hawks
Counting so much damn green, hurt my damn thumb
I was trying to fucking eat, bit my damn tongue
He try to turn up with two hundred ones
He's makin' me laugh
I drink my champagne out the bottle, nigga
I don't fuck with no glass
So many gualas in my pants, nigga
It's makin' me sag
And when I leave up out the lot, nigga
Top in the trash
In "Top In The Trash," Gucci Mane raps about his extravagant lifestyle and riches. He brags about his successful drug dealing business, where he turns drugs into cash and lives a life of luxury. He boasts about his Rolex bezel adorned with red rubies, diamond jewelry, and cars, like a foreign whip. Gucci compares his trap house to famous stores like Bloomingdale's and speaks to his lavishness when he states that he uses Cristal for his mouthwash, purp codeine to brush his teeth, and bottled water on his face. He also boasts about his ability to attract attractive women, saying that all his hoes are supermodels, and that when he pulls up to the lot, the hoes will drop. Gucci Mane's rhymes represent an unapologetic celebration of a life centered on illegal activity, violence, and opulence.
Line by Line Meaning
Well, I'm blowin' kush, endorsin' it
I'm smoking marijuana and promoting it
For those that ain't as fortunate
For those who don't have access to this lifestyle
I work my fork, I work my wrist
I'm cooking and selling drugs
Got babies like the orphanage
I have a lot of children like the orphanage
Got cabbage like a cabbage patch
I have a lot of money
Got collard greens and turnips, bitch
I have more money and assets
I turn 'em in the turnin' lane
I'm constantly buying cars
I'm always in a foreign whip
I always have a luxury car
My trap boomin' like Bloomingdale's
My drug business is thriving
A long line like you at the Ritz
There's a long line of people waiting to buy from me
Got bank like Lloyd, Yayo like Tony
I have a lot of money like Lloyd Banks and drugs like Tony Yayo
But won't give you 50 cent
But I won't share my wealth with you
Red rubies on my Rolex bezel
I have expensive jewelry
It look like I slit my wrist
My jewelry is so flashy that it looks like I've cut myself
White diamonds like I'm Liberace
I have even more expensive jewelry
Bitch, come here and kiss my fist
I'm violent and intimidating
I use Cristal for Listerine
I don't care about expensive things
I brush my teeth with purp codeine
I use drugs for everything
I wash my face with bottled water
I only use expensive things, even for mundane tasks
Drink champagne straight out the bottle
I don't care about formalities or etiquette
All my whips got superchargers
All my cars are modified for maximum speed
All my hoes are supermodels
All my women are beautiful and desirable
He go hard but I go harder
He's trying to compete with me, but I'm always one step ahead
He faker than Harry Potter
He's not genuine, like a fictional character
So much money in my safe
I have a lot of cash
I don't think that I can close it
I have so much money that my safe can't hold it all
So much money in my jeans
I carry a lot of cash with me
I don't think that I can tote it
I have so much cash on me that I can't carry it all
Had a good day
I had a successful day making money
And then I went and bought a Rollie
I rewarded myself by buying a luxury watch
Shorty brain me so crazy
She gave me great oral sex
Had to tell the girl to hold it
I had to ask her to stop because it was too intense
Got a college girl, just spoken words
I'm involved with an intelligent woman
She think that she a poet
She thinks highly of her artistic abilities
When I smash the girl, just spoken words
When I have sex with her, it's intense and passionate
I have to keep her focused
I have to maintain her attention and interest
'Bout to put me out the buildin'
I'm causing a disturbance
Cause I got some nosy neighbors
My neighbors are overly curious
Say I'm smokin' loud and they complainin'
They're complaining about my smoking marijuana
'Bout the noise and fragrance
They're complaining about the smell and noise
Think I'm going through a phase
They think my behavior is temporary
Cause my verses are amazing
Because my song lyrics are impressive and popular
Think I'm walking through a maze
They perceive my lifestyle as confusing and complicated
When I'm walking through the station
When I'm walking around the area
Drawing pictures with my words
I'm creating vivid mental images with my lyrics
While these other niggas tracin'
Other rappers are copying my style
Walking back and forth pacing
I'm anxious and restless
Like my girl gon' have a baby
I'm nervous and stressed about my personal life
When I pull up to the lot, aye
When I arrive in my car
All the hoes gon' drop, aye
All women will be impressed
Like look at his watch, aye
They will notice my luxury watch
Like look at his car
They will notice my luxury car
Look at his earrings
They will notice my expensive jewelry
Look at his his bling bling, aye
They will notice all of my flashy accessories
That nigga stuntin', just damn near killed the scene
I'm showing off and impressing everyone
Make bitches scream and faint, aye
I'm so impressive and intimidating that women react strongly
I just poured me up a pint of that purple
I'm drinking codeine syrup
I don’t like red
I don't like red codeine syrup
You want to fight bitch, you might be dead, aye
I'm aggressive and willing to fight
Red white chalk, some niggas in the rear with black hawks
There's violence and police activity in my area
Counting so much damn green, hurt my damn thumb
I'm counting a lot of money
I was trying to fucking eat, bit my damn tongue
I was eating and accidentally bit my tongue
And when I leave up out the lot, nigga
When I leave the area
Top in the trash
I'm the best and leave everyone else behind
Lyrics © Warner/Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: Keith Cozart, Radric Davis
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
Chad Thomas
We need this trap music back 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
Z Mane
Gucci hasn't went this hard in a while
Easy Breezy Beautiful Thugger Girls
Zach B listen to Sea Sick by Gucci Mane
Andres
Didn’t you hear what he said, he thinks he’s going through a phase cause his verses are amazing.
Marques Harris
One of Gucci best songs easily lol. That first verse made me break my arm.
m c
What What lmao fax
fomoco16
Why can new guys not make this music??? This was awesome
Lokii
Still bumpin this
Houston Joe
God damn this go hard!!!
m c
Houston Joe yah