Everything’s Good: Chance The Rapper’s Difficult Journey to Happiness
Chance the Rapper has been defying expectations his entire career, consistently challenging what’s considered possible outside the traditional music industry. In the past year alone he became the first unsigned artist to perform on SNL, dropped the best verse on Kanye’s last album, and pressured the Grammy’s into changing their rules for eligibility. To say that he’s succeeding on his own terms would be an understatement.
But with the release of his last album, Coloring Book, Chance is finally becoming as well known for his music as he is for challenging the status quo. In a genre that’s so often preoccupied with pain and despair, his music stands out for its optimism. It’s really unprecedented — Coloring Book has to be the happiest rap album ever made. Only Khaled comes close to matching Chance’s positivity, but even he has the I-told-you-so attitude of a guy that’s been under-appreciated for a decade and is only now getting his due. As a 23-year-old, Chance doesn’t have that kind of baggage.
But what’s been forgotten in much of the recent hype around Coloring Book is that not only is this positivity uncommon in hip-hop, it’s unfamiliar territory for Chance as well. Up until recently his music was filled with the despair of growing up with constant violence in Chicago. When we look at Coloring Book through the pain of his previous album, Acid Rap, we see how incredible Chance’s newfound happiness really is.
“And I still be asking God to show his face.”
Coloring Book is maybe the closest thing we have to a mainstream gospel hip-hop album. He’s so unapologetic in his devotion to God that I’m surprised it hasn’t turned off more of his secular fans. But on Acid Rap, Chance doesn’t have this faith — his prayers have gone unanswered while his city is covered in bloodshed. Unable to find peace with God, he uses drugs to numb the pain, or as he puts it, “trip[s] to make the fall shorter.”
On the hidden track “Paranoia,” Chance describes the hopelessness that comes from growing up surrounded by gunshots. He can only hope for rain — if everyone stays inside the shootings are delayed, if only for a day:
It just got warm out, this the shit I’ve been warned ‘bout
I hope that it storm in the morning, I hope that it’s pourin’ out
I hate crowded beaches, I hate the sound of fireworks
And I ponder what’s worse between knowin’ it’s over and dyin’ first
Cause everybody dies in the summer
Wanna say ya goodbyes, tell them while it’s spring
I heard everybody’s dyin’ in the summer
So pray to God for a little more spring
It’s not that there’s no happiness on Acid Rap, it’s just filled with the weariness of being constantly reminded that everything can change on a dime. The song “Chain Smoker” is an interesting example. What starts as a celebration of self-confidence immediately turns into Chance’s realization that, as he puts it, “YOLO was a lie.” He’s terrified that he’ll die before he reaches his true potential and writes the song knowing it might be the last one he ever writes. It’s even more chilling when we remember that at this point Chance is only 20 years old.
Acid Rap is Chance searching for answers on how to possibly cope with this unending anxiety. On the last song we find him scatter-brained, listing all the little things he can think of that brings him joy. As he repeats the phrase “everything’s good” it sounds like a mantra he’s using to try distract him from his incessant pain.
“It seems like blessings keep falling in my lap.”
So what changed in only three short years? Pretty much everything, it seems. We get a clue from the song “Finish Line,” where he reveals how his drug use was destroying his body and ruining his career. The nightmare that he described on “Chain Smoker” was starting to come true.
Scars on my head I’m the boy who lived
The boy love playing when the boy too sick
Reclining on a prayer, I’m declining to help
I’ve been lying to my body can’t rely on myself
Last year got addicted to xans
Started forgetting my name and started missing my chance
Almost hitting rock bottom, Chance rediscovered faith after years of uncertainty and everything seemed to fall into place — he got his career back on track, fell in love and became a father. And Chance is ecstatic in his newfound faith. He raps with the joy of someone who’s not hoping for healing, but believes heaven’s already on earth.
But, of course, it’s not. The murder rate in Chicago is skyrocketing. When I first heard Coloring Book I wondered how Chance’s new music could sound so upbeat while his home continues to fall apart. I started to wonder if the album was somehow less authentic than, say, Kendrick’s, who’s music is obsessed with the pain of survivor’s guilt. Even “Summer Friends,” the one song on the album that’s about the crisis, sounds positively joyful in comparison to the terror we heard on “Paranoia.”
But recently I’ve started thinking that I might be wrong about Chance’s newfound happiness. For one, it’s unfair and, frankly, foolish, to judge how someone endures a difficult situation. But I also realized that maybe Chance’s joy is strategic. Perhaps uncompromising optimism is not only his way of coping, but also a tool that’s necessary for his community. As writer Alex Obasuyi says, “In a time when we are constantly bombarded by images of violence carried out on black bodies and black people…joyous music…provides us with relief and a much-needed break.”
The “utopia rap” of Coloring Book might just be different form of his prayer for rain on “Paranoia.” By providing a much-needed break from the relentless violence, he’s creating a space where he can breathe, regroup, and heal his city.
