Gunns Blazing

I’m led to believe the career of the Buffalo rapper Westside Gunn has an elaborate backstory.  The details don’t particularly interest me.  I only care about the enormous pleasure I derive from his hilarious 2020 albums Flygod Is an Awesome God 2 and Pray for Paris.  The ridiculous recordings scratch an itch the similarly playful but unapologetically infantile raps of hitmakers like Roddy Ricch and Lil Uzi Vert don’t reach.  In addition to doing an even better Ghostface Killah impression than Action Bronson, Westside Gunn relies on dusty soul and jazz samples evoking the glory days of Gang Starr and Ultramagnetic MC’s.  Yet the genuine sense of menace place Flygod Is an Awesome God 2 and Pray for Paris squarely in the here and now.


---
Opera update: Tchaikovsky’s “Eugene Onegin” is the 111th opera I watched in the past 111 days.  I was disappointed to learn it’s not about the Pacific Northwest.

(Original image by There Stands the Glass.)