Prison can change anyone. Enough time isolated from the world, treated as subhuman and discarded like garbage is soul-breaking and creatively stifling; it would be hard for anyone to maintain sanity or balance, regardless of a strong belief that one day you’ll be back on the outside. When Gucci Mane was finally freed from the United States Penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana back in May, it was a joyous moment for his fans but it was unclear what effect being gone since 2013 would have on the rapper and the music. Seeing his dramatic weight loss and new healthy regimen on Snapchat was a shock but a welcome one, if it meant avoiding the vices that had nearly destroyed him.
During that time in prison, the one thing that kept Gucci’s name relevant in music—beyond the success of the younger artists he had supported, like Young Thug and Migos—was the steady stream of mixtapes that were able to come out using his unreleased music. Since being freed, he’s taking over the reins and is making up for lost time with the release of Woptober, three months after his first post-prison album Everybody Looking. Woptober is more attuned to the classic Gucci Mane aesthetic than Everybody Looking; The production is colder, murkier and with heavier bass, with Gucci slinking and swimming through it with precision and clearheaded insight. Songs like “Wop” and “Hi-Five” highlight this with an icy, brooding sound; and Gucci feels perfectly at home there. Despite the newfound clearness of his voice, likely a result of those shed pounds, it still has that guttural allure. On Woptober, Gucci can be fun and playful, grimy or poignant and thoughtful and sometimes he’s all of these things at once.
Woptober gets off to a great start with “Intro: Fuck 12”: the Phantom Of The Opera piano keys giving the song a ghostly, demented air while Gucci comes in strong, focused and charismatic: “I ain't never been embarrassed, I ain't never felt fear/I got post-traumatic stresses like I can't shed tears,” The album proceeds with this laser focus and thoughtfulness throughout. Everybody Looking, while a good record, was more celebratory, a big “welcome back” party for Gucci.Woptober goes back to the dirtier, oddball style that Gucci became successful with but this time, it’s more disciplined and perceptive. On the album’s best track “Dirty Lil N***a”, Gucci takes a moment to relate to the fictionalized street kid he’s spent the song rapping about. “The streets don't kill him, then the law gon' get him/Better listen to me kid, it's a fucked-up system/Y'all might don't feel him but I damn sure feel him/Cause I was just in a jail cell fucked up with him.” It’s the same avenue that Boosie has always taken—somber but not preachy or self-righteous, and it suits Gucci Mane well as a rapper who’s always been good at reaching out to young artists and understanding youth culture.
The album’s first single “Bling Blaww Burr” is a much brighter affair, a club record more memorable for its infectious ad-libs than anything else. It is the stale kind of party record Gucci can make in his sleep and a Young Dolph feature can only do so much for it. “Money Machine” is boosted by a better beat and a guest appearance from Rick Ross. Woptober slogs towards the end, but it moves too quickly to feel like a chore to sit through. It has all the markings of what we’ve come to expect from Gucci’s music only this time—rather than drowning in his addictions—he’s found a way to integrate drugs and violence into his new outlook. new life outlook. It’s a great strategy and, if he plans to continue pushing music out at such an accelerated clip, it’s hopefully just a taste of what’s to come.
