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.”
Work Ya Wrist
Gucci Mane Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
The difference between a pimp and a street nigga dog
Is a pimp nigga work his bitch
A trapper work the trap, a pimp work the track
But a street nigga works his wrist
(4x)
Work ya wrist then, well work ya wrist then
And my wrist flexible like I broke my wrist bone
I got muscles in my wrist, cause the 4 touched the pad
I can't count every play I use different rubber bands
Red means 30 stacks blue means 10 packs
When I say Imma skreet nigga bitch I mean that
Hold up, Hold up, this shit won't cake up
80 thousand dollar profits so I bought a Jacob
Yeeaahhh, yeah that's my favorite word
Hit a plug with the herb and connected with the bird
He hurt he know homey where ya been dog?
Ain't no sense in callin' Gucci less yer buying 10 dog
I crossed 10 state lines just to bring the pack here
Go'n fill ya W-2s out cause I'm taxin'
I'll pay for that ass I ain't never been a mack
But ya front me a pack, I'll bring that money back
Gotta stay fresh, all white tee
Dark Gucci lokez so the boy can't see
Triple beam scales, 5 for the pound, 12 for the Q-P, it's goin down
Yeeahh, and I'm sick wit it I got major cake
And I blow 50 Gs on a rainy day
I got hard white, I'm with Gucci Mane
We fuckin 50 hoes cause they some Gucci fans
There's a stack dirty, there's a plaque dirty
His jeans cut and his slacks dirty
Blowin bubble gum, we gettin blew down
Like it's Mardi Gras, we got the top down
Imma chef too, name Dough Boy
Call me Boston, Georgia, or just blow boy
Fucked a bitch who's gettin stacked
Keep it moving less you movin' this pack
Whatcha say Gucci?
I was thinking out loud
Bout what?
Sellin whole better break the shit down
Sackin Gary Payton I was gonna buy T-O
Sat 24, a whole, 80 country "Whoa-flow"
I got 30 bricks sold add 60 mounds of gold
I'm the same way in case yer baby mobile wanna snow
D-boy swag mane, shawty that's what I got
Got that Larry Bird yay, and it's jumpin out the pot
You be down motherfucker cause you know I'm too hot
Sick wrist game dawg I ain't talkin bout my watch
Want a chain like mine, but ya can't afford the price
You can call me frigidaire because I pack a lotta ice
You can spin the world like the Earth on it's axis
I'm gainin' wait dawg just like a fat bitch
Gotta mean with some pea, wanna learn just watch
Nigga, red stop sign nigga roll kush stop
The song "Work Ya Wrist" by Gucci Mane featuring Yo Gotti is a trap song that focuses on the theme of drug dealing. The chorus of the song brings out the difference between a pimp, a trapper, and a street nigga. The difference is that a pimp works his woman, a trapper works his trap, and a street nigga works his wrist, which means he is selling drugs through his wrist action. In this chorus, Gucci Mane is urging the street niggas to work their wrist and make money.
In the first verse, Gucci Mane is talking about how he has developed his wrist movement as a drug dealer. He talks about his wrist's flexibility and strength, which is capable of breaking his wrist bone. He also mentions how he uses different rubber bands for different bundles of money he makes. He then goes ahead to talk about how he makes a lot of money from drug deals and how he spent some of it on buying a Jacob watch worth $80,000.
In the second verse, Yo Gotti talks about how he is keeping up his fashion game by wearing all-white tees and dark Gucci lokez so that the law enforcement officers can't easily spot him. He brags about his wealth, hard white, and hooking up with Gucci Mane to get 50 girls because they are fans of Gucci. He then concludes by stating that he has a sick wrist game that is unmatched and cannot be compared to his watch.
From the song, we can imply that it promotes drug dealing, which is why it has been a controversial song over the years. It's a song that most people cannot comfortably sing in public places, and it's usually played in clubs and bars.
Line by Line Meaning
The difference between a pimp and a street nigga dog
Pimps work their women, while street guys work individually.
Is a pimp nigga work his bitch
Pimps work their women, so their women can get them money.
A trapper work the trap, a pimp work the track
Drug dealers work the trap, pimps work the street corner.
But a street nigga works his wrist
A regular street guy makes money through his hand-work rather than working through others.
I get my wrist game on cause my wrist game strong
I work hard with my hands because I am really good at it.
And my wrist flexible like I broke my wrist bone
My wrist is so flexible that it looks like it's broken.
I got muscles in my wrist, cause the 4 touched the pad
I have developed muscles in my wrist because I am constantly using my hands to type on a phone or keypad.
I can't count every play I use different rubber bands
I use different rubber bands to help me keep track of how much I earn from various deals, but there are so many that I cannot count them.
Red means 30 stacks blue means 10 packs
I use different colored rubber bands to represent different amounts for my money. Red represents $30,000 and blue represents 10 drug packages.
When I say Imma skreet nigga bitch I mean that
When I say I'm a street guy, I really mean it.
Hold up, Hold up, this shit won't cake up
This situation won't turn out profitable for me.
80 thousand dollar profits so I bought a Jacob
I made an $80,000 profit, so I bought a Jacob watch.
Yeeaahhh, yeah that's my favorite word
Yeah is my favorite word.
Hit a plug with the herb and connected with the bird
I received weed from a contact, and it led to me receiving drugs.
He hurt he know homey where ya been dog?
He is upset because he knows my location and that I have been successful.
Ain't no sense in callin' Gucci less yer buying 10 dog
There is no point in contacting Gucci Mane unless you are buying a large amount.
I crossed 10 state lines just to bring the pack here
I traveled through 10 states to bring the drugs here.
Go'n fill ya W-2s out cause I'm taxin'
You need to start paying me my share because I'm taxing you.
I'll pay for that ass I ain't never been a mack
I will pay for your company because I am not a player.
But ya front me a pack, I'll bring that money back
If you give me drugs upfront, I will sell them and bring you the profits.
Gotta stay fresh, all white tee
I need to keep my clothing fresh, and I wear all-white t-shirts.
Dark Gucci lokez so the boy can't see
I wear dark sunglasses with the Gucci brand so people can't see my eyes.
Triple beam scales, 5 for the pound, 12 for the Q-P, it's goin down
I am using triple beam scales, selling $5 for a pound and $12 for a quarter pound.
Yeeahh, and I'm sick wit it I got major cake
I'm really good at this and I have made a lot of money.
And I blow 50 Gs on a rainy day
I spent $50,000 on a day where it was raining.
I got hard white, I'm with Gucci Mane
I have cocaine, and I am with Gucci Mane.
We fuckin 50 hoes cause they some Gucci fans
I am sleeping with 50 women because they are fans of Gucci Mane.
There's a stack dirty, there's a plaque dirty
I have stacks of money and plaques that are dirty.
His jeans cut and his slacks dirty
His jeans are torn, and his slacks are dirty.
Blowin bubble gum, we gettin blew down
We are blowing bubble gum in the car while getting high off of drugs.
Like it's Mardi Gras, we got the top down
We are riding with the convertible top down like it's Mardi Gras.
Imma chef too, name Dough Boy
I also have cooking skills, and my name is Dough Boy.
Call me Boston, Georgia, or just blow boy
You can call me by either Boston, Georgia, or just Blow Boy.
Fucked a bitch who's gettin stacked
I slept with a woman who has a lot of money.
Keep it moving less you movin' this pack
Keep it moving if you are not moving this drugs, otherwise we can do business.
Whatcha say Gucci?
What do you want me to know, Gucci?
I was thinking out loud
I was just talking to myself.
Bout what?
What were you thinking about?
Sellin whole better break the shit down
I can earn more money by selling individual packages than selling whole packages.
Sackin Gary Payton I was gonna buy T-O
I am planning to sell drugs and buy Terrell Owens (T-O) jerseys.
Sat 24, a whole, 80 country "Whoa-flow"
I am selling a whole $240 worth of drugs in 80 different countries.
I got 30 bricks sold add 60 mounds of gold
I already sold 30 bricks of drugs and have 60 pounds of gold to sell.
I'm the same way in case yer baby mobile wanna snow
I am well-prepared in case you want drugs for your baby.
D-boy swag mane, shawty that's what I got
I am a drug dealer, that's my swagger.
Got that Larry Bird yay, and it's jumpin out the pot
I have cocaine that is really good and is hopping out of the pot.
You be down motherfucker cause you know I'm too hot
You will go down if you mess with me because I am really good at this.
Sick wrist game dawg I ain't talkin bout my watch
I have good hand-work skills in making money, and I'm not talking about my watch.
Want a chain like mine, but ya can't afford the price
You may want a chain like mine, but you cannot afford it.
You can call me frigidaire because I pack a lotta ice
You can call me a fridge because I have a lot of diamonds (which are also called ice).
You can spin the world like the Earth on it's axis
You can turn the world around like it's rotating on its axis.
I'm gainin' wait dawg just like a fat bitch
I'm gaining weight like a fat woman.
Gotta mean with some pea, wanna learn just watch
I have a mean attitude and you can watch and learn from me.
Nigga, red stop sign nigga roll kush stop
When you see a red stop sign, you stop. When you see me roll weed, you stop and watch.
Lyrics © O/B/O APRA AMCOS
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
Fire Thief
This is EPIC AF. Gucci and Gotti together slayed this track, bruh...
purpose and goals
hellll yeahhhhh 🔥🔥
Rusty Shackelford
The beat was disintegrated
Mr Magik
This joint still slap in 2018!!!
KostaCox
Love Gotti's verse
Eastside ChuccTaylor
This was the shit in 09' mane🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
Doelowz
🔥🔥🔥🔥2022...Yo gotti verse killed it
wildruffus17
this track is killin it
oranqero
gucci and gotti go together like peas and carrots
Blake Gallagher
2019 still hittin