Westside Gunn — Pray For Paris: Immediate thoughts and reactions
The album’s title is Pray For Paris but the timeline was actually praying for the rapper releasing said album.
In a since-deleted Instagram post (but the tweet linking to the IG post is still up, gotta love this IG plugin) on April 13, Westside Gunn confirmed that he had been battling the coronavirus. It turns out that the Buffalo rapper had been ill. Thankfully at the time of the Instagram-slash-tweet, he was now feeling better.
But the illness helps explain why Westside Gunn’s new album Pray For Paris comes so suddenly and with so little warning. What tf do you do when you think your days might be numbered? You drop the album, fuck a release cycle.
Up to this point, WSG has hit all necessary landmarks. He’s created the beloved mixtape series with Hitler Wears Hermès (now up to №7 in the series) and the underground classic album that wasn’t an album in FLYGOD (which is somehow still not available on streaming services smh), he has the vaunted crew with him in his Griselda brethren and he’s received the cosign of a who’s who of rap royalty, from Combat Jack (Hitler Wears Hermès 4 has a song titled Combat Jack Speaks and it’s exactly what you think it is) to Eminem (whose imprint Shady Records has signed Griselda) and the godfather Jay Z, who basically signed Griselda to a management deal.
Of course, it all works because Gunn’s music is unrivalled. The Griselda head honcho spent the last decade creating a mystic universe where the wresslin’ analogies are plentiful and his music follows a typical formula that revolves around numerous references to designer brands in the lyrics, boatloads of drugs being dealt and gunshot adlibs, all on a gorgeous bed of old school samples so dark and unknown you can practically feel the dust of the vinyl where Griselda in-house producer Daringer and others have found them.
All of which is to say that this is WSG’s time and the stakes couldn’t be higher. He’s hinted at the album as far back as Hitler Wears Hermès 2’s Eric B track. Can he keep this insane run going and keep Griselda entrenched in the middle of the culture? There is also apparently a Premo beat on the album, let’s see if we can pick it out without the help of Google.
As we do around these parts, we’ll run through Pray For Paris and give our unfettered thoughts.
1. 400 Million Plus Tax
Let’s go, we’re ready. We’re wearing a black hoodie and our Timberland boots because we’re old-school (and broke frankly) but in our mind they’re Balenciaga. Take it away, Flygod.
This one starts with a sample, it’s the sale of the Salvator Mundi for $400 million at an auction. Nice table-setter. Quick question: if this man paid $400 million (plus tax) for the painting, how much did Westside Gunn pay for the right to use the sample?
2. No Vacancy
No Vacancy is a DJ Muggs beat and you can pretty much slide all over the keys. Gunn starts with “Bonjour” because of course lol. (More like “Bun-jur” too smh.) “You ever made love to the pot? I ain’t think so. You ever threw up from smellin’ too many kilos?” When you’ve survived a global pandemic, there’s no sense in wasting a single bar. Nice table-setter to open the album, now we’re definitely off and running.
3. George Bondo (feat. Benny The Butcher & Conway The Machine)
The Griselda gang: all three rappers dropkicking fools on a Daringer sample, my lord. WSG and Griselda have become masters at creating ominous and scary loops and George Bondo is no different. You wouldn’t walk home on a deserted street with this playing in the background. Westside Gunn bats leadoff and he’s in his storytelling bag. One day we’ll need to go long on which of the WSG adlibs is the best one. “Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom” stands out more but his “Doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot” jars you to attention. “Still plottin’ and schemin’, on the cot, daydreamin’,” amen, man.
No chorus on this one. We don’t mind, sometimes the beat is all you need. If you can’t come up with a proper menacing 16 to this Daringer flip, you don’t deserve to call yourself a rapper in the first place. Conway The Machine is up now, we’re eager to hear what he has to say after the excellent LULU EP he dropped so recently. What a verse man, holy hell. Conway explains how, basically, he’ll fuck you up because that’s what he’s always done — and he might be famous now, but that doesn’t change anything. “My life is definitely changin’, Roc Nation brunch, I’m with a R&B singer gettin’ better acquainted.” Nice reference to meeting Rihanna, Conway. Talk your shit. “It ain’t another rapper that’s alive that can match my pen” is a hell of a bar. The only two who might are your two labelmates probably?
One other thing we’ll likely need to go long on is which of the three Griselda rappers is the MVP. Benny The Butcher’s turn now and his flow is just like water. He raps so effortlessly, although we’re not sure about the decision to include a reference to Patrick Kane in his raps. We’re glad he clarifies immediately what it means to Patrick Kane someone because you could think of something completely different.
4. 327 (feat. Billie Essco, Joey Bada$$ & Tyler, The Creator)
Man, what a ride this last track was. Can I just go hang in a dark alleyway with weed and a 40z or two? Sorry but, who is Billie Essco? Nice, floating chorus though, I don’t mind it one bit.
Gunn is leading things off on this posse cut. The man has such a unique voice, he could be rapping about more or less anything and we’d tune in. “Balenciaga with the heel, lemonade a popular drink still,” nice nod to GangStarr and DWYCK. The thing about Gunn having such an excellent ear for beats, and he undeniably has that yes, is that the man can also straight-up rap. He’s not the absolute greatest rapper in the world, which is totally fine, but if and when he catches a pocket in a beat he’ll be as good as anyone currently in the game. He can also switch flows on a dime, someone have him meet DaBaby.
“Roses at my feet, n***** kneel, bitches yell. Glitter on my neck match the glitter on my fingernails (Ayy, yo). N***** always got something to say, well fuck ‘em.” Talk your shit, Tyler. Unbelievable performance from the guests, seriously there hasn’t been a single wasted verse, or bar, so far; everyone has stepped up. Gunn is 4 for 4 so far and 327 is the clear highlight.
5. French Toast (feat. Joyce Wrice & Wale)
Another deep and unknown flip of haunted keys and another song that starts with Gunn telling us “Bun-jur.” Oh, Westside Gunn is in Paris serenading a fine French woman in this one. Having “You can put your legs up, you can choke me while I eat it” on the second bar kinda makes that much pretty crystal clear. Look, Gunn might be an absolute dog in the bedroom but he’ll still take his love interest to the Louvre and the Eiffel Tower to seduce her. That’s game. He’s singing on the chorus, probably to show this mystery woman that he can, and it’s fine.
WALE! We haven’t listened to the man in a good seven or eight years but he’s perfect for this beat. He’s caught a pocket and lifted off. At this rate, Wale might never fall back down to Earth. “My chain look like it’s Rue de Paris, I swear it get lit,” bahahahah.
Here we go, finally a wresslin’ interlude. Damn right: the main event most certainly is FLYGOD.
6. Euro Step
OMFG this beat is filthy. This beat is absolutely filthy but Gunn is floating through the mud and the dirt, looking as fly as ever. God, he barely starts and stops almost instantly after barely a minute. Why? Too bad, we could have listened to a full album over just this instrumental.
The Ghostface Killah outro is from this video below. We got GFK on the WSG album!! Even though it’s just a sample and not an actual cameo, this is glorious, we’re about to cry.
7. Allah Sent Me (feat. Benny The Butcher & Conway The Machine)
Westside Gunn, Benny AND Conway rapping on a Daringer grimy-to-hell beat? Hell to the fuck yes. Arm, leg, leg, arm, head indeed. (Is it too easy of a joke to say that they’re like the Three Musketeers hanging out in Paris?) We’re back to the horror movie vibes with this instrumental, you are one glorious motherfucker Daringer. “Allah sent me here to be the king,” talk your shit, King. Gunn has the rap world eating from his palm and we couldn’t be more happy about it.
Oh wow, hold up! Not only are we having Gunn, Conway and Benny on a Daringer beat, they’re actually just going back-and-forth????? This is the most beautiful thing we have ever seen in my life!!!! Can we please just stay in this moment forever and ever???? :’(
TED DIBIASE IN THE BUILDING!!! Nice interlude lol.
8. $500 Ounces (feat. Freddie Gibbs & Roc Marciano)
LOL OMG ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! We follow up a track with the Griselda three-headed monster with one 1) featuring Freddie Gibbs, 2) featuring Roc Marciano and 3) produced by The Alchemist? Take all of our money, Gunn!!! Alchemist is so freaking soulful man, what the hell. We feel like hitting the store and actually shelving out money for a pair of Balenciaga even if we’re pretty sure we’ve never actually seen these shoes from up close and we could never ever ever afford one.
Quite the contrast between the three rappers, the gruffy and menacing Freddie Gibbs with the bodacious WSG and the calculated and deadpanned Marci. Kane is first to rap and he’s sliding on this glass table of a beat. He mentions not having cooked or dealt coke in so long, get you a friend who would do for you what Lambo did for Gibbs. “I got skeletons in my closet, right next to Balenciaga.” Hahha I swear, I hadn’t even read the lyrics before writing the previous paragraph. “I drop a load, I take a load off, that’s load management,” Freddie Gibbs you beautiful motherfucker!
Roc Marciano’s turn now. You know what they teach you at school about showing us through your writing rather than telling us? What colour were the seats in Marci’s Benz? Not beige-brown but “Lenny Kravitz skin.” Unreal, Marci, we don’t deserve you. Yooooo then he says he’s been “Livin’ comfortably off of gut instinct.” WE ARE NOT WORTHY, ROC!!
Gunn brings things home with a solid verse as well. “You hang with a rat, you a rat, too,” can we please get this tattooed on our chest? What a flawless track man.
9. Versace
We follow what’s likely the best song on the project with a shorter one. Nice pace to the project, Gunn really, truly is an album rapper. You can practically see the banquet hall this vocal loop was lifted from, it’s so beautiful. Gunn raps about any- and everything here and closes things about life before Griselda and fame, life where he did time and couldn’t see the ones he loved.
10. Claiborne Kick (feat. Boldy James)
Nice interpolation of a “RAW IS” sample that leads straight into Gunn’s FLYGOD drop. Nice touch. This is another beat from The Alchemist and it’s a song featuring new Griselda signee Boldy James. Woah is this Gunn rapping chopped and screwed? Has to be the first time he’s ever done this, no? “Started gettin’ better work then the money came faster. Had to sit down a bit, came home, back at it.” Again with a nod to his past time inside.
James is a seamless fit with Griselda. “Whole camp solid, snatch us up, you won’t get one confession,” if you are cool with a rat you’re a rat yourself, remember?
11. Shawn vs. Flair
WSG himself spoiled things when he dropped the tracklist and production credits on the Thursday before the album dropped, but we would have known right from the first kickdrum. This beat is unmistakably Premo and it starts with a Prodigy sample, followed by one of Phife?? Yes lawd. May the two rest in peace.
DJ Premier cooked Westside Gunn a pretty Griselda-like instrumental, one that is unmistakably his, as crispy, clean and knocking as a Premo beat always is, but also one that’s firmly at home on this album. It must be the keys. The chorus of “Ayo, you ever ate burgers on a Wednesday? You ever ate chicken on a Thursday?” sounds wonderful until you realize it’s yet another reference to incarceration. Damn :(
12. Party Wit Pop Smoke (feat. Keisha Plum)
Woah! Tyler, The Creator uncorked an unreal sample for this one! Honestly this beat is so freaking sick, I would have given it a perfect 10 regardless of whoever spit. But Gunn is skating. “Ain’t no eye for eye, you take an eye, we take your whole head.” MY LORD!!! Do not mess with Buffalo folks.
Long-time associate Keisha Plum is also one not to fuck with. “If he got a felony, it’s guaranteed to excite me. Gun and drug charges give me butterflies. Evil as Satan, but I see God all in his eyes.” Any question?
13. Le Djoliba (feat. Carter Williams)
Here we are, final track. Time for one final snort. (Kidding, kidding, of course.) What is this sample? Is this what dying feels like? We are in heaven right now. Please just spin this instrumental at our wake, we don’t ask for much. Folks need to know that nothing in music brought us greater joy than a mean sample — and this one is amazing, wtf man. “The way my fuckin’ neck look, they think I sold my soul.” Perfect line, absolutely great. If there’s one single line to encapsulate Gunn’s entire ethos, this is the one.
Let’s also have folks write this on our graveyard when we pass please.
TL;DR
Westside Gunn might be the hungriest man in rap music but on Pray For Paris he’s straight up cooking. He keeps on track Griselda’s ascent toward the top of the rap game with a focused and beautiful album that taps into the nostalgia of any rap fan who grew up before the trap took over. (Which is not to say we hate trap music, hell to the no.) Despite an insane productivity and having flooded the market, the law of diminishing returns be dammed, the Griselda method has never felt so vital or fresh as it does on this Westside Gunn album.
(That said, what is behind the album’s name? We’re definitely overthinking this but is it Pray For Paris in that hiphop is a cathedral that needs saving? In any case, it’s quite the journey to the city of love and one might think the album title says more pray for Paris to survive Gunn’s visit — but we digress.)
Pray For Paris documents the entire universe of Griselda and maybe that’s the entire point. The lyrics speak of dealing drugs and surviving the unforgiving and cold streets of America — nay, of Buffalo — a stark contrast to the often beautiful instrumentals from the album, but Griselda are far from a Wu-Tang Clan cover band hoping to ride the coattails of ODB, RZA and the likes. Griselda are their own men, and ultimately their raps borrow as much from the golden days of boom bap as they do from those of, say, the Gucci Mane peak mixtape era.
Ultimately, this is a one-of-a-kind album from one-of-a-kind artist. Not quite the equal to FLYGOD because what could even rival it, but Pray For Paris is on par with anything else he’s ever put out. It’s certainly not stomped-on, diluted shit. Pray For Paris is grade A, pure. And we’ll be back for seconds before long.
