On April 26 of this year, Kevin Gilyard, best known as rapper Kevin Gates was sentenced to an additional 30 months in jail, while serving time for an assault charge at one of his concerts prior. With possibly another two years distancing himself from freedom, it serves as yet another tragic note in the controversial life and times of Kevin Gates. He is a man who has the tendency to say the most recklessly unguarded content on social media or in interviews, often to the detriment of a career built off immaculately-crafted street rap. A man who constantly proved time and time again that he had one of the best pens, and could come up with anthemic hooks like it was nothing, one could imagine if the game ever truly accepted Kevin Gates, he could be a top tier star; and given the overwhelming success of his platinum certified debut album Islah from last year, it seemed just within reach.
What lures potential fans over to Gates might be pop smashes like “Satellites,” “I Don’t Get Tired” or “2 Phones.” But what keeps them staying are the smorgasbord of tracks that range from themes of romance to homicide, all managing to sound professionally crafted and evocative. Here at HotNewHipHop, we’ve assembled 10 tracks that hardcore Kevin Gates fans know and appreciate, while casual listeners might not have gotten a chance to hear give or take their point of arrival. Now with Kevin Gates freedom seeming more and more distant, it feels more and more necessary to treasure all of the brilliant music he made in order to appreciate him when he finally comes back.
Kevin Gates - My Momma Know
Now nearly a decade old, Kevin Gates' Pick Of The Litter mixtape is a most impressive debut that clearly demonstrated a talent that would take him far beyond his humble beginnings in Baton Rouge. For the most part, the mixtape is a gloomy listen of street rap that had echoes of early 50 Cent, Boosie and TI hanging over it, and it focused more on hard rhymes and storytelling than trying to make hits. “My Momma Know” is pretty straightforward tough talk, but differentiates itself with bars like “I put that on my unborn child and my throwaway” and graphic descriptions of near-death experiences that focus on immaculate details like the stitching of his pocket, or peeking through blinds of closet doors. Kevin Gates was always a rapper with immense talent as a writer, it was learning how to make music for a mass audience that was going to take him some time.
Kevin Gates - Get In Da Way (Remix ft. Lil Boosie)
While Gates might now be one of the bigger names in rap, at the end of the 2000s he was certainly not his city’s favored son, as that’d unquestionably be none other than Boosie Badazz, who in 2008 was up there with Gucci Mane as one of the biggest southern rappers in the game. Naturally, Gates was someone who looked up to Boosie as a rapper and when his early single “Get In Da Way” was pushed as a potential radio single, his then-label saw fit to get Boosie on for the remix in order to secure attention. Boosie is of course at the top of his game and spitting with fiery passion, and for what it's worth Gates is no slouch with a catchy hook and melodic delivery. The only really questionable moment on this early song is a particularly bad fake Jamaican accented part…Thankfully of all the things Kevin has tried and left behind, this is one of them.
Kevin Gates (KVN Gates)- When The Lights Go Down
After years punctuated by periods of incarceration, mixtape grinding and struggle, Kevin Gates briefly saw himself managed by none other than Young Money, then flush with success from the likes of Nicki Minaj and Drake becoming household names. During that period he failed to receive a contract with their label, and soon dropped his In The Meantime EP credited to ‘KVN Gates’ due to contractual obligations. For the most part, the project is not quite as fleshed out as the peak of Gates’ material, as the beat selection tends to verge into generic trap and Gates himself hadn’t become quite nearly as confident a singer. A simple case of ambition outweighing the abilities, but “When The Lights Go Down” feels like one of the earliest steps in the right direction. Gates hook has a weird accent that might be reflective of his Louisiana background, and his bars have a post-Wayne rambling quality as he casually mentions farting and Chicken Teriyaki as if people needed to hear it. And maybe that was the trick, as Kevin Gates learned to say any random shit with conviction, he knew he could get people to believe in him when he had important content to speak on.
Kevin Gates - Luca Brasi Speaks
The careers of Kevin Gates and Nashville’s Starlito is actually strangely parallel in certain ways; a pair of young rappers who found themselves signed to the Cash Money Records system at an early age only managing to release sporadic mixtapes to the praise of clued-in bloggers, and occasional singles, while never QUITE getting the push of some of their peers. Given how more than a few of those who actually managed to get singles out (Lil Chuckee? Really?) went nowhere, it's truly a testimony to how, despite getting entrenched in career limbo and industry politics, both these rappers managed to build huge cult followings nationwide.
On Starlito’s Cold Turkey, he felt it necessary to let his new collaborator (whom had likewise let him deliver a show-stealing verse on Gates’ “MYB”) take a record by himself for nearly a whole 3 minutes. Over somber sounding electric guitar, Gates drawls darkly on religion, drug dealing and violence in a way that sounds deathly serious. It's a typically solid Gates outing, but I think it’s more special just in the context of watching one of Gates peers and mutual admirers have the appreciation to let someone like Gates put themselves front and center for all of his own fans to see. More than any co-sign, it shows a lot when a rapper of the caliber of Starlito feels comfortable taking a step back to let someone else shine.
Kevin Gates - Arms Of A Stranger
Arguably the beginning of the second phase of Kevin Gates’ career, The Luca Brasi Story is the mixtape where you can really feel the rapper not only find his comfort zone but start making those gestures to his ambitions as more than a hardcore rapper but the kind of artist who could craft the kind of songs his Young Money superiors were allowed to make. Featuring professional production, high-name guest verses from the likes of Curren$y and Master P, and a general ‘big-budget’ feel, you could tell that Kevin Gates wasn’t letting his departure from one of the biggest labels slow him down. If anything, this was the start of a relentless campaign of mixtapes, touring, and drive that would soon finding him reaping the fruits of his own labor. The S1-produced “Arms Of A Stranger” doesn’t feel like a song from someone like Gates, whose discography is full of so many murder tales and lurid sex romps. In fact, there’s something gentle and fragile, perhaps even downright feminine. While the beat’s effervescent horns blare from far away, Gates is practically whining in his vocal town, crying out about separation anxiety and shouting out none other than the one-man romance novel industry, Nicholas Sparks. There’s an unmistakable post-Drake feel present, but whereas Drake can certainly sound silly with his saccharine sad boy pose, Gates vulnerability is downright jarring and thereby compelling. Clearly, there was nothing to lose for him anymore that he could present himself on record in such an uncompromising way that listeners could find either endearing or pathetic. Luckily for Gates, his gambit paid off immeasurably.
Kevin Gates - Twilight
Speaking of Gates’ more or less ‘amusing’ literary tastes… This other cut from The Luca Brasi Story has everything; an anthemic chorus about romantic devotion, an impressive beat by Mr Morris, and tales of sexual entanglement while Gates…uh, may or may not casually fantasize about being a vampire. Nerdier moments from Big Kev aside, "Twilight" is yet another song that features Gates in heart-broken mode being charming as hell while crooning Omarion off-key and describing his own friends being blown away by how much of a sappy cartoon he can be. It's good to know that as ridiculous as these songs can tip over into, even Kevin understands that, and can have a laugh at his own expense.
Kevin Gates - White Tan
As much as Kevin Gates the songwriter found himself playing up the idea of being a romantic character who crooned to ladies, that didn’t necessarily imply that he’d gone soft. For every song like that, Gates was additionally applying his craft to his more hardcore content in trying to create hard anthems for every audience. “White Tan” off his follow up to The Luca Brasi Story, Stranger Than Fiction is a marriage of all the lessons Gates had taught himself alongside old-school tales of drug-dealing paranoia and sinister dread. Few in this decade could provide such eerily specific details, not only sound commercial, but show a songwriting style that didn’t require a ‘hot sound’ or gimmicky rap styles. And as a result, it was pretty clear just why Gates was starting to go from an obscurity that bloggers occasionally checked in on, to one of the many rising stars of rap. Stranger Than Fiction also commemorated his signing to Atlantic, still his current home several years down the line.
Kevin Gates - Cut Her Off (Freestyle)
Freestyles to popular records aren’t always as easy to appreciate in the current decade, after years and years of struggle rappers thinking every popular record needed to be repurposed with a couple of throwaway bars from them. For every Lil Wayne, there were more than a few guys who felt less like they were improving, and more like they were leeching. So as much as freestyles can go either way for rappers, Kevin Gates is the kind of guy who doesn’t simply use a popular chorus to prop up the 'hot 16.' Here on the Will-A-Fool-produced K Camp smash, he lays waste to the beat, finding pockets with ease as he rushes into hyperactive double-times before suddenly switching off into crooning without autotune. Here in particular he’s incredibly menacing and cocky, giving you the feeling that if he wanted to, Gates could probably go to town on the industry and make you forget a couple of people’s original singles with his new and improved versions standing superior.
Yo Gotti - Ion Know Them (ft. Kevin Gates)
As much as Kevin Gates can do well on his own, he can also benefit from the chance to work alongside another rapper and serve as a contrasting element. On Yo Gotti’s “Ion Feel Em,” Gates guest verse comes in making him sound like he’s not only sinking mud, but you had to pull this man out from the bottom of a lake. With Metro Boomin’s gothic-sounding synths soundtracking them, Gotti and Brasi make a perfect pair with the former incredulous at social media leading to people’s downfall (almost a darkside cousin of his eventual hit “Down In The DM”), while the latter’s haggard drawl gets filtered through autotune and distortion while sounding more paranoid and world-weary than ever before. That’s the benefit of an artist like Gates, who can manage to bring an emotional tone to records from guys who never quite have the reputation of depth such as this.
Kevin Gates - 911
A cruel tease on the soundtrack of the latest Fast & The Furious soundtrack, “911” might not be anyone’s favorite song if you’re a hardcore Gates fan. But the track’s pop-dancehall feel makes it feel perfectly at home next to songs by the likes of Drake and Justin Bieber or international stars like Popcaan or J Balvin, demonstrating in all his time away, he's still as ready to make hits as ever. As much as the skill and lyricism of Kevin Gates gets praised here, and deservedly so, it's his pop sensibilities that continue to amaze. If Kevin Gates, the man, wasn’t so prone to getting in the way of Kevin Gates, the artist, who couldn’t see him becoming one of the biggest names in the industry, rap or otherwise? With songs from Gates that much harder to get, “911” is a beacon of hope that not only is it worth waiting for him, this isn’t the end of his career either, but just another momentary setback.