A Year of Lil Wayne: "Kush" (Yes, Like Weed)

Day 114: "Kush" –  The Leak EP , 2007

"Kush" is one of my favorite Lil Wayne songs, so today I don't want to talk about the context or its overarching place in the Wayne canon or anything else. I just want to point out how dope it is—and not just in the weed sense (although, in case you live under a rock, kush is a popular and potent indica strain of cannabis originating in the Hindu Kush mountains of Pakistan and Afghanistan). I so keenly remember my friend Dan playing it for me and giddily pointing out the line "I'm feeling like I'm racing a bunch of little turtles." Like, what could be more accurate than that? Wayne really was playing the rap game in a way that made it look like he was in a completely different league. I love this whole first verse:

Sure, it may have been reckless for him to believe that his grill kept him safe from dental problems (my guy had to have EIGHT root canals three years later, right before he went to prison), but this verse is just a master class in managing to rap your ass off and sound laid back at the same time. The metaphors are all great. There's a reference to the Ninja Turtles, confirmed best cartoon and way better than the Power Rangers, not that I'm still litigating the arguments I had as a five year old.

What really makes this song shine is the beat, which is pure, golden, angelic, chopped-sample, harmonic goodness. Wayne tackled all kinds of beats between the Carters II and III, and he's often (justifiably) most lauded for the way he elevated dance-y Southern rap tracks into scorched-earth lyrical exercises. But many of his best songs from the period, including many of those originally slated for Tha Carter III before it leaked, were over these types of sample-driven, more traditionally East Coast beats, like Wayne was a lost member of the Diplomats (which, in a way, he was). Wayne's rise in the public estimation is generally framed as linked to the rise of the South as a seriously respected musical entity, but it's no accident that much of the work that actually built that reputation was on the traditionally "lyrical" rap world's home turf. Anyway, I said I wouldn't talk about context! This beat is so pleasant!

In the second verse, Wayne says he's "gotta do coupes," as in he can't drive regular cars. Then he shouts out DJ Screw with a screwed down vocal on the first part of "fuck with me, I'm on that screw juice" before addressing concerns about his syrup intake: "But I keep my shit together, not a screw loose."

The concluding verse has another one of my all-time favorite Lil Wayne lines, after he goes from the meandering words of "This shit ain't fair, I didn't have to go there / but all this ice got me feeling like a polar bear / I'm so aware, I'm so prepared / I'm so fly I'll take off into the open air." He pulls up and pauses to emphasize each word: "Lift off. Cristal. / Please. Crackers with cheese." Crackers with cheese. Lil Wayne just set out an hors d'oeuvres platter on the track. Remind me again what your favorite rapper has done lately.

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