This is my favorite album ever made and It’s also the album that influenced me most.
It’s Childish Gambino’s first album and I find it underrated as hell. I got it as soon as it came out and prob know the whole thing by heart.
Outside
This is a strong beginning for the album, and a really good song. It has once of my favorite hooks on the album and Gambino goes in on it. It’s a really deep song, where he talks about his childhood and how rough it was. This song is also about the stereotype that black people have to do “Hood Shit” I really like this song.
Firefly
This is also a strong, deep song. I really like the sound of this song. This song is partially about how hard it is for him to be successful, because he’s not “Hood” enough and partially how girls are hitting him up now, because he is famous.
Bonfire
I’m pretty sure this is the first single that he released from Camp and goddamn, this shit goes hard. This is a great song full of great songs, comparable to “Freaks and Geeks.”
The beat is crazy and Gambino just tears it apart. The lines in this song are just redic.
My favorite line out of this song is probably:
“I don’t talk soft, that’s that other guy
I’m screamin’ “What the fuck is up?” like I ain’t seen the sky.
The shit I’m doing this year? Insanity.
Made the beat then murdered it: Casey Anthony.”
The first time I heard that line I was just like: “ Damn.”
I don’t like that people think this is his best song, but it is a really good song on the album.
All The Shine
I enjoy the intro of this song. It’s a chill song, although Gambino does go in on it. It’s about how he loves and hates his fame and also how he’s with a different girl every night. I think it’s really tense how he ends his last verse with:
“ I always wanted to be picked for the cool team,
But alone is exactly how I should be”
This shows that he has a loneliness that he feels that he deserves. He also says:
“Sometimes I feel like I ain’t supposed to be here,
Sometimes I wake up, I don’t want to be here”
That line makes me so sad. Not just because Gambino is my idol, but because the way he says it is so sad and full of emotion.
Letter Home
This sounds so epic. The orchestra and his voice. It’s so dope. It’s the violins from the song before. It’s just about how he wants to get back together with his ex, whom he still has feelings for. Nice little break in the album. Another sad/deep song, which leads perfectly into the next song.
Heartbeat
This song is crazy. First off, it’s the only song that they really played on the radio, and therefore the most known Gambino song. Second off, when I saw him in Paris and he played this and then L.E.S. I teared up. I don’t cry easy, so thats a big accomplishment and I have no shame to say that.
This song is about the girl that’s right for him and how it’s hard to balance sleeping around with girls that you don’t have feelings for and still talking to the one you do. Hands down the most emotional song on the album and when I listen to it, it hurts, because it brings back a lot of memories. A lot. So you guys better be happy that I’m reviewing this.
The ending of the third verse is the most famous part of the song, if not of all Gambino. It goes:
“Ayo, Fuck this.
Are we dating? Are we fucking?
Are we best friends? Are we something? In between that?
I wish we never fucked and I mean that.
But not really, you say the nastiest shit in bed and it’s fuckin’ awesome.”
It’s a whole big clusterfuck of mixed signals from the girl. They are done, but she keeps texting him sexually and hooking up with him. He wants to know what they are, but if they are nothing then he is done.
Backpackers
This is a nice break from the emotional songs before this. This is pretty much 3:15 min of Gambino going HAM on a beastly beat. The only part I don’t like is the “Fuck you n*gga” break in the second verse.
In this song he is saying that he hates “Backpackers” A.K.A. people that think that only underground rap is good and that Gambino sucks, now that he is signed and released a commercial album.
L.E.S.
This is another super deep song and also a sad one.
During this song he talks about how girls use him because they see his clothes and see that he has money and want it. The correct term I believe is a “Gold Digger” haha.
I really like the line:
“I’m a mess,
That don’t rhyme with shit, it’s true.”
It’s just a sad line, him just straight up saying that he is a mess and not ok. He breaks up the whole rhyme pattern of the song with that too. I also like the part where he calls her a hipster and then is like “not in the lame way,” since he’s trying to get with her.
I really like the bridge of the song, where he says:
“Ohh girl, I wanna know.
Are you ready to cry? Cause I’m no good, no good.
Ohh girl, I wanna try.
I’m an awful guy and I’m always away
And I’m tryin’ to say,
I’m a piece of shit.
Believe in this,
Cause we barely knew, what we had.
I’m not that bad, the fun we had.”
How can you not feel the emotion in this song. He’s pouring out his heart in these songs. I can relate to the ending, I’ve often been called a piece of shit by girls I’ve had things with and have often felt like one due to those actions. This song is gonna be my wedding song hahaha.
Hold You Down
This song is about racism and how it’s keeping him down. It’s also a kind of emotional song, although not like L.E.S. and Heartbeat. I like it though. It has a nice sound and it flows nicely. I really like the line:
“My fear is dead,
Ambition drove the hearse.”
Thats some deep shit right there.
Also, the last line where he references Jay-Z is bonkers.
Kids
This song is about how Gambino wants a girl, who can keep up with him. This song starts out with a sick intro and Gambino singing about how he wants a girl to keep up with him. I can also relate to this, because all I want is a girl that can hang and keep up with me at parties and etc.
He also talks about how he doesn’t bother to text back to her and takes out his anger by being mean to girls that don’t deserve it. annndddd I can relate to that as well. Damn, I’m a dick.
Gambino also explains why he likes asians so much with the line:
“Finding you is like finding Asians I hate,
But they say I got a fetish, nah I’m skipping all of it.
Black or white girls always come with a set of politics.”
He’s basically saying that Asian girls are less drama then black or white girls, which I can tell you guys is true. I think that the reason that I’m attracted to Asian girls is because of Gambino’s influence on me.
Damn, look at me getting all personal in this review.
You See Me
When Gambino came to Penn State a couple weeks back, he said “This song goes out to all the Asian Girls” before playing this song. During the little pause between him saying that and the beat starting, I yelled so loud and everyone around me looked at me like I was crazy.
This song on the other hand is crazy. It’s insane. The beat is so good and full of bass and Gambino goes bonkers in this. This song really makes me wish I was attending UCLA just because he references it in the hook. Gambino’s flow and rhymes are so good in this song. This song is just one big Asian reference and I love it. Just look at the line:
“Forget these white girls,
I need some variation.
Especially if she very Asian.”
This song goes so hard, like damn. I’m remembering how it was live and damn. Mike and me were going crazy.
I also think that what he says in this song is insane.
“And I’m cumming on her face, have I gone too far?
I don’t know, who cares, I don’t love that broad.”
He’s asking if him saying that he is cumming on a girls face is too dirty for lyrics and also asking if it’s too far to have gone with the girl. He then says that he doesn’t care because she doesn’t mean anything to him. This can also be seen that he is saying that he feels that the lyrics will be too dirty for his female audience, but he doesn’t care because he isn’t in love with them.
He also has a fast verse towards the end of the song that is very very good. One of my favorite Gambino songs.
Sunrise
This song is another high energy song by Gambino with no shortage of energy from him. I really like the way it sounds and he has some great lines in this song. I’m surprise that he kept the energy all through out the album up until and including this song. Can he keep it up for the last song of the album?
That Power
Yes he does.
This song starts off mellow and the background sounds angelic, but then he starts rapping and he lays down a hard ass verse, full of dope lines and metaphors.
I really like the line:
“Holla, holla, holla, holla at ya boy,
Like yo dad when he’s pissed off”
Thats such a dank line. His verses in this song are so sick. He’s destroying the beat and as I first heard this song, I didn’t believe he would end the album going so hard. The last line of the last verse is:
“ I am what I am: everything I wanna be.”
I mean, I think that would have been a dope way to end the album, but it didn’t feel like the right ending.
And then, guess what? I kept listening and the camp outro came on and I was speechless. It’s a crazy personal story about when Gambino was on the bus back from camp and how he confided in a girl and she broke his trust and told everyone. I think the most important part in this is:
“I wish I could say this was a story about how I got on the bus a boy
and got off a man more cynical, hardened and mature and shit.
But that’s not the truth.
The truth is I got on the bus a boy.
And I never got off the bus.
I still haven’t.”
That’s crazy for me. That he realized that he hasn’t changed since that moment. That was his defining moment in life. It didn’t make him more mature or anything. It made him into someone that has his private things out for everyone and therefore he can’t have a lasting relationship with anyone.
I think this is the best possible ending for the album. None of us have gotten off the bus.
Like I said before, this is my favorite album. I have it on my IPod and my IPhone. I don’t think I’ll ever be more influenced by anything as much as this album. While writing this review, I noticed a lot of things about myself. I give this album a 10/10. Trust in Gambino, for he has never failed us.
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