KE On The Track (feat. Future) - Dark Side (mixtape, 2013)

KE released the second installment in his EDM Nation mixtape at the top of the year, and Future proceeded to rap on one of KE’s dance-ready tracks. The result is pretty great, albeit tragically short. 

Gucci Mane (feat. Future) - Fuck The World (Brick Squad, 2012)

Gucci and Future have finally found their stride this year as a duo after a string of disappointing projects last year (including the enjoyable, yet entirely uneven FreeBricks), and “Fuck The World” is just another exercise in this new found chemistry. It helps that Mike Will helmed the song, and with the resurgence of creativity he’s brought to Gucci this year, along with his musical soulmate Future, this was bound to succeed even if all the elements didn’t come together.

“Fuck The World” certainly isn’t a perfect record, and that’s really no one’s fault but Gucci’s. Even though Gucci manages to come out looking strong in the end due to some unexpected disses directed at Yung Joc and Block Ent., he’s clearly coasting here, and sounds mostly uninspired. When he says “I did a song with Lil Wayne and I killed it,” rhyming the previous line with “killed it” yet again, you’ll be longing for the days of “AK47 hit ya everywhere from the ankle up”. 

Truthfully, this song could’ve failed without Future; but Future’s slightly angsty, but mostly resilient chorus is a beautiful thing to behold. That’s not even touching on his verse, which caps off the song, where he once again visits his sickle-cell-ridden sister from “Bigger Picture,” and the cousin who killed himself in “Deeper Than The Ocean.” Future really gives you a reason for his fuck the world mentality, and its his positive demeanor while spouting off these terrible life events that makes this verse truly motivational. 

Lil B - Ho Suck My Dick (Tony Montana Based Freestyle) (Youtube, 2012)

Lil B rapping like Future rapping like Al Pacino talking like a Cuban. 

Incredibly important.

Future (feat. T.I.) - Magic (Freebandz/Epic, 2012)

Future and Tip chill out on the top of Magic City for the latest single from Future’s Pluto. Even though I don’t like this version as much as the original T.I.-less version found on True Story, it’s always to great to get new visuals from the Askranawt Kid.

Gucci Mane (feat. Future) - Sometimes (Brick Squad, 2012)

It appears that Gucci is spending more time writing these days, and less time shaving (what’s with the crustache, man?). I’ve actually avoided this track for a couple days, and I’m regretting that now. Since Freebrickz dropped last year, I’ve been well under the assumption that Gucci and Future have absolutely no chemistry. Despite the cues that Future takes from Gucci’s playbook, both are two distinctly different rappers that compliment eachother in no way. Unfortunately, they have the same fanbase, and that means they’re gonna be collaborating until the day one of them does one too many lines. 

It’s been frustrating following Gucci, and though some may argue that Gucci has been showing flashes of brilliance once again, this isn’t the first time that Gucci has really been spitting well again. Both “North Pole” and the Yo Gotti-assisted ”Animosity“ from Mike Will’s mixtape were strong reasons for me to believe Gucci maybe back to form. Truthfully, he’s been rapping well on and off since last year’s Writing On The Wall II/Freebrickz (which didn’t work as a collaboration, but did allow Gucci to flex his pen for a minute before being hauled back to jail). While the leaks for Trap Back are good (I don’t think any of them really constitute as the best thing Gucci’s done in the past 12 months), I’m still not convinced if this is the return of the Gucci of yore.

“Sometimes” is great though. Gucci’s rapping pretty openly about his life for a change, his top down so he can “look up at the galaxy” to clear his mind. His verse is so good that it’s almost a shame when Future comes on. Though Future is moderately self-aware here, he still misses the opportunity to silence critics by focusing on the skulls and spikes that he really spent too much time rapping about on Astronaut Status. It’s not that what Future is doing is bad, by any means, but when stacked up against a driven Gucci, he does fall flat (it doesn’t help that Drumma’s production brings Future’s normal energy down to a stuttering halt). This is exactly why Freebrickz failed as a whole.

Trap Back will come out on February 5th. It will probably be simultaneously great and uneven. Which means I’ll listen to it more than anything else this year.