This album has been haunting me for the last two weeks. I am unable to put it down, it demands dialect.
I am a cloud rap addict. It's one of, if not my favorite subgenres of rap. Taking the euphoria of pop melodies and vocalizations and dousing them in effects, creating an empty world for the samples to echo around in....it's my drug of choice. The bliss found in the surreality of those beats is incomparable to nearly anything else. It sounds like heaven...but I'm slowly being convinced this might be the devil's cloud rap album. It's wickedness laid down over such irresistible beauty...how can i deny myself of these tracks? I've been charmed, to say the least. This is all I've been able to listen to lately.
Okgutta is an absolutely tortured and demented lyricist on this tape. A vast majority of the content across the tracklist is sadistic, detailed depictions of murder and violence. The way bullets demolish human flesh, seeing your marred reflection in pools of your enemy's blood, etc...there are occasional flits of standard trap fair, although no less extreme than anything else being said ... "That bitch you treat just like a gem I'm treating like a dog" is a line in particular that glares at me, the whole opening track is just so diabolically depraved, and stands out as one of my favorite tracks. This juxtaposition, these heavenly beats soundtracking these demonic exploits of violence, it's something I feel like I've never heard executed quite like this. It's the soundtrack of a dream playing under the prose of nightmares.
"I FOUND SOLACE IN THE ACT OF MURDER"
"THE MAN I KILLED HAS BEEN HAUNTING ME"
"IT'S OK, IM OK WITH KILLING PPL IN MY SLEEP"
These are outrageous titles, and yet at no point do I roll my eyes, cringe, really even doubt anything this dude is saying. There is just EVIL laced into this project...but that's not why I keep coming back. I am more than just terrified and enamoured with this project...I am devastated by it.
The sixth track of this project ruined my whole day when I heard it. "I READ PSALMS BEFORE I KILLED YOUR FRIEND" is a sort of confessional moment, the most vulnerable track of the album. The deeply melancholic beat is so captivating, and complimented so flawlessly by the soul crushing lyrics being delivered. The entirety of the track is a hopeless rumination on the sins of the lyricist, the ache of awareness that he cannot be forgiven, that there is no glory, no righteousness to be found in this depravity, this violence. He mourns the dreams of his childhood, the death of his aspirations, the friends he'll never get to see again because he's so positive he will never get to join them in heaven. I've been brought to tears a few times by this song, and the sentiments of others. It was here that the title of the album fully clicked with me.
"GOD (B)LESS AMERICA"
The violence, the regret, the torture of living, feeling love for your weapon and hatred for practically anything else, a full listen of this album just leaves me feeling so empty. Such a potent, visceral piece of art highlighting what a hellscape we live in, how truly godless America has become....that it can fail people so thoroughly, so absolutely. This man was just a little kid once. No guilt on his mind, no red in his ledger, no hatred or gun smoke for anyone. It is that thought that makes this album truly ruining for me as a listener. I think it's brilliant, impressively crafted, and addictive as the very best cloud rap I've come across. But it becomes less and less fun to listen to with every replay. I am deeply saddened that such a dystopian piece of art could ever be convinced.