Nevermind The Posers

By oZ Litvac

I heard about this unsigned rapper by the name of Childish Gambino.  My first reaction was, ‘what a silly name, I hope he can rap.’  Then I watch the video for “Freaks and Geeks” and decided quickly I am not impressed.  I kept an open mind and gave some more tracks a listen.  There was a small amount of lyrics that caused me to raise an eyebrow, that’s about it.  Although the dude can flow, he portrays an image of a young kid with lame metaphorical references about uninteresting things such as his penis and girl ass’s that he fucks.  The problem is, he is not a kid nor is he that young to capitalize on childishness.  Besides, Bieber already did that.

The desperate attempt to rhyme like the influences that birthed his courage to rap is at best pathetic.  Even though he swears he reinvented the wheel with that corny dance in the video, I am sure I have seen someone else do it before.  The beats sound like every other Lil Wayne beat, and the flow sounds like every rapper getting plenty of spins on the radio, but lacking originality and imagination.  It is safe to say he will have his fifteen minutes of fame because he has some talent, and his live performance (on you-tube) seems to have some good energy, at least the one or two live videos I’ve seen.  But just as fast as he popped out of nowhere, he can be forgotten by next year.

We don’t need another Kanye West or Lil Wayne, that is for sure.  So if Gambino has nothing new to bring to hip hop, it is only a matter of time before he becomes the next has been.  Because if he plans on making it based on skills alone, it is thrice as hard as if he actually knows the right people plus puts in the work it takes to evolve into a respectable rapper, and even then it will take years which will require him to stay relevant.