Post #1 of Zach Schwartz’s new column for Rap Genius, ZACH TWO TIMES.

Zach Schwartz is a writer currently living in New York City. His prose and poetry have appeared in Thought Catalog, Metazen… Read More Gucci Mane recently apologized for his Twitter rant against the whole music industry. He blamed his insanity on lean, saying that he was “addicted to [it] and that shit ain’t no joke...I can barely remember the things I’ve done & said.” He personally apologized to Rick Ross, Birdman, and Drake, as well as his former girlfriend, Keyshia Ka’oir (who, as of this writing, is the only person he is following on Twitter).

Gucci was recently arrested and sentenced to prison with a release date of April 10. The circumstances in which he was arrested seem like, totally insane. First he had that epic Twitter meltdown. Then, the next day, he released "Diary of a Trap God." Then, the next day, he almost got into a fight with a civilian at a mall. Then, the next weekend, he got arrested, when a friend flagged down police because of how concerned they were about the way he was acting. It doesn't seem like Gucci would surround himself with anyone who would go to the police to solve a problem, so whatever he was doing, must have been a serious fucking problem.

A recently released video gives a good idea of what was going on in Guwop's head in the days before his arrest. The video in question, “Me,” is the visual for one of the songs off of his "Diary of a Trap God" mixtape.

"Me" has Guwop chanting a chorus of "me, me, I only think of me" over a sparkling MikeWillMadeIt beat. In the verses, he drops gems like "I front the dope then me come shop with me, "MTV that's me TV,"and my personal favorite, "they should name me Demetrius cause all I think about is me."

The video shows Gucci, all alone, on a sun-baked estate surrounded by half-naked women. All the girls in the video seem completely devoid of emotion. Gucci doesn’t show emotion either, he just stands there sipping copious amounts of lean and smoking blunt after blunt after blunt. It’s like, all pretty bleak...This is a Gucci Mane who has given into his Freudian id, the kid inside of us that screams “me me me me me me”—and he literally does that in the song, at the beginning of his verse 2.

But as anyone who’s had experience with painkillers will tell you, that’s what will happen. It’s that, “I don’t need anyone, all I need are my drugs” mentality that Gucci is going through that’s getting reflected in the song. Since he’s successful, he can maintain that illusion/lifestyle for much longer than normal. It’s like Scarface in his mansion, screaming that he only trusts himself, that he has drugs he has money and he has women who love drugs and money so fuck you if you try to tell him that that’s wrong.

I was at one of Gucci Mane’s last shows before his breakdown, in Cleveland. I got backstage and stood a couple feet away from him, and there was an already an anger about him back then, a negative energy swirling like the beginnings of a hurricane. He came into the venue, performed a couple of songs, stopped way before the promoters wanted him to, and walked out. After that show, the timeline probably went something like this: he went to his mansion, went on a crazy drug binge, alienated everyone close to him, and finished “Diary of a Trap God.” Then the lean caught up to him and he got to a point where he straight-up couldn’t function in a society with rules anymore, and his friend called the police.

Lean has done enough damage in the industry. You have its most famous casualty, Pimp C, but you also have those its wounded, like Gucci Mane, Lil Wayne, and Mac Miller (Mac Miller?). Lean is a painkiller, which, in my opinion, is the most dangerous form of Drug.

But the double cup is an instrument of Style, and it's totally accepted in hip-hop culture. As Lil Wayne summarized all of drug culture in "Duffel Bag Boy":

"As a matter of fact, its gon' kill me...cause you ain't!"

And then he laughs his broken honeyed laugh and the song gets to partying.

The first time I tried lean, I was 15 years old. My friend Marvin, who was like an older brother to me, introduced me to the drug, like he did most drugs. He poured it for me in a double-cup and handed it to me. He had already been using it for some time—Marvin was an amazing musician, and for him, drugs often came with art. I sat and sipped it kind of tepidly as I watched my friend Damian mix a rap song we were all working on, called “Overdose,” about overdosing on drugs. Crazy/shitty youth...

I remember it gave me a really bad headache. Later that night, I got dropped off at Border's to finish a school project with my friend Ralph, it was a school night after all. He laughed at how I looked, with my eyes all bugged out and shit. Our friend Joanna came too and she laughed and said “oh my god, you drank lean with Marvin...” I nodded with my head heavy and I slept heavy that night too.

At one of the Rap Genius parties earlier this year they were handing out styrofoam cups that said “genius juice.” I saved mine, in case I was to ever drink lean again. I thought about sipping it with Marvin, smoking blunts driving around listening to rap music like we used to. But then when I went home over the summer, I found out that Marvin was now in rehab for serious opiate addiction. Its been six months and I haven't felt the need to touch any painkillers since.

Painkillers almost took my friend Marvin away from me and they almost took Gucci away from me too. Two of my favorite artists, gone via drugs. So, lesson is, as Gucci says, that shit ain't no joke. Sip responsibly.

ZACH TWO TIMES is a new column for Rap Genius written by Zach Schwartz, about rap music, literature, art, drugs, and life in general.

Follow Zach on Twitter @zach_two_times