21 Savage x Metro Boomin – Runnin

I’m hella late on this but you’ll have to forgive me because life has been brazy lately. Better late than never!

Like I said in my last post, this feels like a fucking movie! I’m loving the foreboding beat and the evil laugh in the beginning. As my brother pointed out, Savage’s half-assed ‘running’ dance move also just adds to the overall dark vibe here somehow; if I was doing it it would not look remotely intimidating but he somehow makes it sinister.

“I’M SLAUGHTER GANG P*SSY, YOU KNOW I BOUGHT MY KNIFE” I love Savage’s sporadic but consistent messaging over the years going back to his earlier tapes that you know he has his knife on him/that he brought his knife because he’s Slaughter Gang; all rappers talk about keeping their strap with them but something about always having your knife on you just sounds even grimier. I’m feeling Metro Boomin’s knife dance move when he says it too.

“2016 we was running around beating niggas up in the club”

“I LEAVE ALL MY CARS RUNNIN, RUNNIN, RUNNIN, ALL MY OPPS BE RUNNIN, RUNNIN, RUNNIN”

“I’M IN THE DEN WITH THE THIEVES”

“All that pillow talk I’ma have to send the boogie man come and get you”

I hate the sample that they play at the end of this/beginning of the next track on the album but I’m glad that Morgan Freeman drops plenty of jewels throughout to make up for it. Like I said in my last post, my brother nailed it when he said they got Morgan Freeman going from narrating March of the Penguins and Nat Geo’s “God” to talking about rats and snitches on a trap album; these guys are winning. I don’t listen to a ton of mainstream rap these days as you obviously know if you read this site but I have to give 21 Savage credit, this whole album feels like a movie. This is the first album I’ve listened to in a while that felt like an ‘event’ to me and we could certainly use that in 2020.

This was a dope concept for a video too, to bring the Grammy back to the hood.