Gunna is one of the most prominent up and coming trap rap stars of this generation. Joining the ranks and co-collaborating with other trap rap artists such as Lil Baby and DaBaby, Gunna is making his own waves outside the Baby-named crew. With hit singles such as DOLLAZ ON MY HEAD (feat. Young Thug), Lemonade, and his feature on Lil Baby’s Drip To Hard, Gunna is making his stay on the charts and becoming a big name in the trap rap genre.
Gunna busted out in the 2010s in a very subtle way with his slurring vocals and stuttering melodic effects which made all of his tracks hit hard and proved he had the makings of a future trap rap veteran.
Humble Beginnings
Gunna, born on June 14, 1993, as Sergio Giovanni Kitchens in College Park, GA was raised along with his four older brothers by his single mother. He started making music at age fifteen and cites Cam’ron, Chingy, and Outkast, among others as major influences on his musical style.
He also attended Langston Hughes High School in Fairburn, GA and by 2013 he released his first mixtape, Hard Body, under his former stage name, Yung Gunna
Gunna has also said that he considers himself a Christian and is very religious. This is a consistent theme within his music as a lot of his tracks make mention or refer to his spirituality.
Rise to Fame
During his teenage years, Gunna began to express an interest in rapping first as a hobby but then started looking into ways he could carve out his musical career. Gunna made his first steps towards this when he was introduced to rapper Young Thug through Keith “King” Troup, a mutual friend and an influential community figure who sadly passed in December 2015.
Young Thug and Gunna developed a friendship, and not long after that, Gunna was in the studio working on Young Thug’s “Floyd Mayweather,” where he lent a verse alongside trap rap icons, Gucci Mane and Travis Scott.
“Floyd Mayweather” hit number 41 on the Billboard’s R&B/hip-hop chart and the single was such a smash that it catapulted Gunna into fame. After scoring his first Billboard hit, he was soon signed to Young Thug’s YSL label.
Career and Albums
Gunna released his debut mixtape, Drip Season with his first label, YSL Records. Not long after this release, he later released his second mixtape, Drip Season 2 in May 2017. Following the release of these two mixtapes back to back, Gunna also released his EP Drip Down with Wheezy, who produced the entire EP himself. The track “YSL” made waves as it featured Playboi Carti.
A remix of Drip Season 2’s track “Drip or Drown” featuring Lil Yachty’s raps was then included on Gunna’s third mixtape released in early February 2018, Drip Season 3.
Gunna released his third mixtape, Drip Season 3, in February 2018. The mixtape was executive produced by sought-out music producer, Metro Boomin, and featured vocals from Lil Yachty, Lil Durk, Nav, Metro Boomin himself, Lil Uzi Vert, and many others.
Gunna’s close friend and fellow trap rap star, Lil Baby, decided to use their magnetic chemistry to collaborate on a few tracks. The two’s chemistry proved successful in early 2018 through their various collaborative singles such as “Sold Out Dates”, which received millions of streams on social media platforms like YouTube and SoundCloud.
Gunna was also featured on Travis Scott’s “Yosemite”, which was the third single from Scott’s third studio album and international hit, Astroworld. The track also features vocals from Canadian singer/songwriter/producer, Nav, which led to an internet storm of memes and jokes due to the unique sound production on Nav’s voice, thus causing more exposure for the track and Gunna’s career.
Due to the unexpected popularity of this part of the song, Scott and the song’s producer, Mike Dean, highlighted Nav’s voice and turned up his vocals on the track a week after the song’s release, thus re-releasing the song and continuing the track’s popularity.
In October 2018, Gunna and Lil Baby released their collaborative album, Drip Harder, which includes the lead single, “Drip Too Hard,” which peaked at #4 on the Billboard Hot 100. Drip Harder eventually gained success on the charts and peaked at number 4 on the Billboard 200.
In February, Gunna released his debut studio album Drip or Drown 2 featuring friend and frequent co-collaborator Lil Baby, Young Thug, and Playboi Carti. Drip or Drown 2 charted at #3 on the Billboard 200 and the lead single, “One Call” went certified platinum, and was released exactly three weeks before the album, which charted at number 56 on the Billboard Hot 100. At this point. Gunna was setting fire to the charts and there was no stopping him.
Gunna eventually saw some attention from the Apple Music streaming service when he was featured on Young Thug’s single “Hot”, which landed at the number one spot the app. Due to the success of the track, it was then released as the single for Young Thug’s freshmen studio album, So Much Fun. “Hot” was also given new life through the remix treatment when in October 2019, Travis Scott added an extra verse to the track. This put the track back on the charts and “Hot” eventually rose to number 11 on the Billboard Hot 100.
The week of Valentine’s Day in 2020, Gunna was featured on three tracks; late Pop Smoke’s “Dior” remix, Marlo’s “My Hood” and A Boogie wit da Hoodie’s “Numbers”, with all of these tracks debuting on February 12th and February 14th, respectively.
On March 6, 2020, Gunna released the single, “Skybox”, at the same time he dropped the music video. Gunna later teamed up with Travis Scott and Van once more to release the collaborative track titled “Turks. The track was released on March 27, 2020, and the second time the Gunna, Travis Scott, and Nav have collaborated on the same song following Scott’s track “Yosemite”.
Gunna released a collaboration track with famed producer Turbo and regular collaborator Young Thug titled “Quarantine Clean” in April 2020. The track is a semi-serious and tongue-in-cheek reflection on the COVID-19 pandemic.
In April 2020, Gunna, Chris Brown, and Young Thug linked up for Thug’s mixtape, Slime & B. Around the same time, Gunna finally released his sophomore studio album, Wunna. When asked about what the acronym meant, he said it stood for “Wealthy Unapologetic N*** Naturally Authentic”. Gunna’s first album would debut at the number 1 spot on the Billboard 200 and eventually would have the number one spot on the Billboard’s Artist 100 for a solid week during the week of June 16, 2020.
Style
Gunna has been hailed as the new king of trap music due to his ability to create lyrical odysseys about high fashion, street life, sex, and luxury items. His flow is also savage as his cadence rises up and down in an almost stuttering rap vibrato. Along with his profound control over his raps, Gunna also adds a mystic type beat to layer on top of his tracks.
Personal Life
In June 2018, Gunna and his DJ were on their way to perform at the Diamond Grill which was a night club in Jonesboro, Arkansas. On their way there, the pair eventually got lost and decided to stop and ask a local police officer for directions to the club. When the officer went by their grey SUV, reports state that he smelled marijuana and saw ecstasy, and other drugs in the vehicle. The police officer immediately searched the car and found edible marijuana paraphernalia, which led to both of them being arrested and taken into custody. However, both Gunna and his DJ were released the next day on a $2,500 bond.
In December 2019, rapper Tec claimed Gunna was on an episode of Crime Stoppers and later claimed to have reported this to the police. Gunna denied the accusations by Tec and responded with “you better do the history” to refute Tec’s claims that were in fact not him in the episode.
In June 2020, gunshots were fired during the filming of a music video for Gunna and Lil Keed’s track, “Fox 5”. The shooting resulted in non-life-threatening injuries for two people involved and no fatalities were reported.
Accomplishments
Gunna has been nominated for the Best Collaboration, Duo, or Group at the 2019 BET Hip-Hop Awards, alongside Lil Baby, for the track they collaborated on, “Drip Too Hard”. Later in 2020, Gunna was also nominated for the same track at the 2020 Grammy Awards.
Gunna also has 114 million views for his track “Oh Okay ft Young Thug & Lil Baby” and 87 million views for “Sold Out Dates ft. Lil Baby” on Youtube as well as 1.2 million subscribers.
He also currently has over 17 million monthly listeners on Spotify and over 50 million streams so far.
On Instagram, he currently has 3.1 million followers for his handle @gunna and 1.3 million followers on his Twitter account @1GunnaGunna.
Gunna is also a TikTok viral star where many users on the platform are recreating and posting videos of their dances to the track “Wunna” from his 2020 album Wunna. He also has 472,000 followers and 2.1 million likes on the app as well.
Future Projects and In The Works
On August 5th, 2020 Gunna dropped a music video for “200 FOR LUNCH” and “DIRTY DIANA” off of his 2020 Wunna album.
There are also rumors that Gunna will be starting his own fashion collection line in the near future, due to the success of his and Young Thug’s “KING SPIDER ZODIAC 12” merchandise collection.
Running with his zodiac themes merchandise, Gunna also has an astrology practicing website you can visit, which is extremely unique and definitely innovative. The website features the ability for you to enter in your birthday and view your natal chart, which is an astronomical snapshot of the stars based on the exact day, time, and place you were born. The chart also asks you where you were born, at what day and what time, and your email address. Your results are then emailed to you.
In addition to your natal chart, you will also get a wunnascope, which is your daily horoscope read by Gunna’s alter astrological ego and co-created by Instagram clairvoyant @TheHoodHealer. They are definitely a lot more interesting to read than your standard, run-of-the-mill boring online daily horoscopes. Check out the website and see for yourself what the wunnascope series has in store for your future.
Full Discography
The following is the full Gunna discography for you to bump for your next playlist:
Drip Season (2016) (mixtape)
- “Outta Sight Outta Mind”
- “Against Me”
- “Young Nigga”
- “Rockstar Status”
- “Cop Me a Foreign (ft. Young Thug)”
- “Can’t Relate”
- “Stay Focused” (ft. Nechie)
- “Solid” (ft. Drake)
- “How Can I Switch” (ft. Young Thug)
- “Going In”
Drip Season 2 (2017) (mixtape)
- “Phase”
- “Belly Of The Beast”
- “Top”
- “Shopping”
- “Japan”
- “Another Wave”
- “Highschool”
- “Make No Sense”
- “Money Talking”
- “Secure The Vibe”
- “Ass”
- “YSL”
- “Park The Car”
- “Get It If You Want It”
- “Beat The Case”
- “Mayors”
Drip Season 3 (mixtape) 2018
- “Helluva Price”
- “Drippin’”
- “Almighty”
- “Top Off”
- “Pedestrian”
- “Lies About You”
- “Mistress”
- “Car Sick”
- “My Soul”
- “No Joke”
- “Spending Addiction”
- “Money Don’t Change You”
- “Toast Up”
- “Drip or Drown Remix”
Drip Harder (mixtape) 2018
- “Off White VLONE”
- “Business Is Business”
- “Belly”
- “Deep End”
- “World Is Yours”
- “Underdog”
- “I Am”
- “Seals Pills”
- “My Jeans”
- “Style Stealer”
- “Close Friends”
- “Drop Too Hard”
- “Never Recover”
Super Slimey Surfers (2020) (mixtape) (ft. Future, Young Thug, Offset and Lil Baby) 2020
- “Want Your Homie Back”
- “Woah”
- “Tomato Interior”
- “Never Coming Back To Earth”
- “Jewel Baby Remix”
Drip or Drown 2 (2019) (studio album)
- “Wit It”
- “Outstanding”
- “One Call”
- “Cash War”
- “Richard Millie Plain”
- “Yao Ming”
- “Idk Why”
- “Derek Fisher (ft. Lil Baby)”
- “Baby Birkin”
- “Speed It Up”
- “3 Headed Snake (ft. Young Thug)”
- “Big Shot”
- “On a Mountain”
- “Out the Hood”
- “Same Yung Nigga (ft. Playboi Carti)”
- “Who You Foolin”
Wunna (2020) (studio album)
- “Argentina”
- “Gimmick”
- “MOTW”
- “Feigning”
- “Dollaz on My Head (ft. Young Thug)”
- “Addys”
- “Skybox”
- “Wunna”
- “Blindfolded (ft. Lil Baby)”
- “Rockstar Bikers & Chains”
- “Met Gala”
- “Nasty Girl / On Camera”
- “Cooler Than a Bitch (ft. Roddy Rich)”
- “I’m on Some”
- “Top Floor (ft. Travis Scott”
- “Don’t Play Around”
- “Do Better”
- “Far (ft. Young Thug)”
Deluxe edition (bonus tracks)
- “200 for Lunch”
- “Wunna Flo (ft. Yak Gotti)”
- “Street Sweeper (ft. Future)”
- “One Watch (ft. Young Thug)
- “Sun Came Out”
- “Dirty Diana”
- “Nothing 4 Free (ft. Nav)”
- “Relentless (ft. Lil Uzi Vert)”
Sources
https://twitter.com/1GunnaGunna/status/1239808976742645760?s=20
add comment