"DS4 EVER The Fourth And Final Installment 💙1/7"
@gunna on Instagram
"This s*** get hard on a n****, I hardly show my feelings, Look up to see stars, but I'm realizing God in the ceiling" - Gunna on livin wild
One of the biggest trap artists in the game, Gunna, dropped his third studio album earlier this year. DS4EVER is a follow on from the ‘Drip Season’ series that were formally mixtapes. The Atlanta native gives us 19 songs in this album. My feelings on this album; it’s okay. There are some solid songs, but as a whole it’s not ground-breaking.
He has a lot of features in this album, with over half the album having a feature. This isn't necessarily a problem, but it feels heavily reliant on others and their part to play. As expected, the features are very Atlanta-heavy, with Future, Lil Baby, 21 Savage, Nechie and Young Thug all present. He also has some interesting features, like Chlöe (of Chloe x Halle), G Herbo and Yung Bleu, who really compliment the songs they’re featured in. Other like Chris Brown, G Herbo, Kodak Black and Roddy Ricch also do not disappoint. The features do a good job for Gunna in this album.
The album starts with the slow-tempo song private island, before the bass kicking in with heavy hitting songs like pushin P (feat. Future and Young Thug), thought i was playing (feat. 21 Savage) and how you did that (feat. Kodak Black). Other heavy bass hitters that start off this album are poochie gown and mop (feat. Young Thug). As we get into the middle of the album, Gunna returns to his signature auto-tune singing on softer melodic beats in alotta cake and livin wild; alotta cake is just him boasting a lot about his flamboyant lifestyle, but livin wild is much more reflective about the life he lives now. He tries his hand with R&B on you & me (feat. Chlöe), sampling They Don’t Know by Jon B. As the album keeps going, he links up with Lil Baby again on 25k jacket with has no hook, with one going after the other. G Herbo gives a strong performance featuring on idk that b***. Drawing nearer to the end of the album, Gunna returns to his auto-tune singing mode, before ending on too easy (remix) with Future and Roddy Ricch.
The production is much more developed here than in the previous Drip Season projects. That being said, the album doesn’t have a massive wow factor for me. Even after only a few listens, it’s not even the best Drip Season, never mind among his best bodies of work. Drip or Drown 2 and Wunna are much stronger albums than DS4EVER, but it’s still early days. I’ll give this album a 5.5 out of 10. There are definitely some good picks from this album, but as a whole it doesn’t move me. My favourite songs are mop (feat. Young Thug), thought i was playing (feat. 21 Savage) and livin wild. If it wasn’t for the ridiculous repetition of “pushin p”, that would also be among my favourite songs, mostly because of the beat. There’s not a lot to say about the lyrical content. It’s all the same things that he always talks about, just like in all of his other projects. Although, he calls out Freddie Gibbs by name saying he can’t f*** with him on poochie gown.
I do like the album cover, which is identical to Young Thug’s Slime Season cover with the sculpture and its bleeding eyes. Furthermore, Young Thug featuring so much on this album shows testament to their relationship and his impact on Gunna. He could’ve done better on this album, as it’s not as good as Drip or Drown 2 or Wunna. The songs on this are not too memorable, bar a few, but we’ll see how this album does after time has gone.