Revered Rapper Freddie Gibbs: ‘It Goes Whitney Houston, Luther Vandross, Then Me’
Yousef Srour Freddie Gibbs is “The Mack” of hip-hop — hunched over a grand piano, two ice cubes in his old fashioned, white dress shirt unbuttoned to his torso, Big Boss Rabbit chain glistening across his neck. Slightly off-tune on purpose, he croons classic soul songs, from The Jackson Five’s “One More Chance” to Stan Smith’s “Stay With Me” to TLC’s “Waterfalls,” but there’s one exception: he wrote them. “Oooh, baby give me one more chance” transforms into “Oooh, baby give me one more gram,” as Gibbs gives them the Freddie Corleone treatment. In tandem with the emergence of Blaxploitation films in the early 1970s, artists among the likes of Richard Pryor and Ron O’Neal have lent their hand as the comedic relief to tales of pimps and gangsters, dealing crack to their respective communities. Freddie wants you to ask yourself: “Is it entertainment or is it an autobiography?” Blurring the line between fact and fiction, “Soul Sold Separately” finds Freddie Gibbs on the Kane Train once again, running hijinks, opening fire and selling cocaine at the $$$ Casino.