Back when my homies used to fry me for listening to LUCKI, he was already a veteran of sorts. It was 2019, and I was 17 and gangly, constantly binging Freewave 3 between classes. At the time, most people saw LUCKI fans like the guy who takes too much acid and keeps asking you to trip with him; nobody was going for it. Try pitching “Poker Face” to some dudes who’d rather fight over Baby and Gunna, and they’d look at you like you body-swapped with Rick Rubin. Maybe I’m a veteran too. Freewave 3, the Chicago rapper’s eighth full-length since debuting in 2013, marked a shift. His music had always been brooding and oneiric, lovesick and drug-tinged, but listening to FW3 also felt like watching a NASCAR driver cut up on the highway. I get why LUCKI had always felt inaccessible: He slurred through bleak allegories about Percocet and rapped over foggy, sullen beats. But the hypnotic cachet of this record shifted the narrative around him from “perceived outcast” to the underground’s diamond in the rough.
Six years down the line, LUCKI is far more ubiquitous than any fan from the Dark Ages could’ve predicted: millions of online followers, a few RIAA plaques and Billboard 200 albums, et cetera. Today his beats lean more towards industry-grade street shit, but his lyrics are still unflinchingly honest. Being famous means he raps more about wealth and Bentley trucks than getting stomachaches from withdrawal, yet the writing still feels personal. After last year’s GEMINI!, the most star-studded release of his career, LUCKI has resurfaced with “Bad InFluence Freestyle,” a six-minute round robin of luxury raps with mafioso finesse. Across three distinct instrumentals, he compresses memoirs into one-liners and acknowledges his growth with a smirk.
He’s no longer making melancholy, post-Doris hip-hop, but when it comes to shrewd, concise lyricism, LUCKI remains in the same class as Earl and MIKE. “Pray to God while you high, but don’t forget to give thanks,” he imparts over piano pindrops and breezy percussion that sounds like NBA Street Homecourt. The images he conjures feel exclusive to him: He cops a Rolex for his mom knowing he can’t buy her happiness; he loves his lil homies but knows better than to give out his phone number. “I gave enough to them,” he shrugs. Over a menacing Michigan type beat, he kicks a flow that stretches past measures like a game of Snake, his stature growing with each breath. He’s not too big to beg for his girl back, though. “Bae, I cannot lose you,” LUCKI pleads in a fast car, “Power to the head with love/No one to give it to.” The more things change, the more they stay the same, I guess.
