No Westside Gunn project stands alone. Each release is like a Marvel movie, made to raise the profile of his Griselda Records brand and introduce new rappers into his tight-knit community of collaborators. If it happens to be really good, that’s a bonus. A Westside Gunn project has both a floor and a ceiling: The worst are not so bad, and the best are exciting, but just a notch below great. Most importantly though, they’re reliable, like a Toyota that’s good on gas and only has to go to the shop once a year.
Westside Gunn’s new album, Who Made the Sunshine, is exactly what you would expect: glamorous beat loops and gaudy raps delivered with the confidence of someone who believes that all of their thoughts belong in the MoMA. His standout solo moment is “Big Basha’s,” where Gunn weaves between grimy and swanky bars. “Glock next to my nuts, Balenciagas oversized,” he says, on Daringer and Beat Butcha production that would suit dinner on a yacht. But outside of “Big Basha’s” the album is less a showcase for Westside Gunn, than for his favorite rising emcees, underground stalwarts, and hip-hop legends.
If you were to rank the top five verses on Who Made the Sunshine, I’m not sure any of them would belong to Westside Gunn. On the eight-minute posse cut “Frank Murphy,” for instance, five guests leave their mark on a soothing Conductor Williams beat. Most notably, the Syracuse native Stove God Cooks mentions that his plug resembles Razor Ramon, compares an act of violence to the Rocky training montage, and offers possibly the first Bruce Bowen name-drop in at least a decade, all in one unforgettable minute. Similarly, “All Praises” overcomes unnecessary Westside Gunn crooning through mellow Alchemist production, a radiant Boldy James verse, and Jadakiss, who never fails to be timely: “Everybody woke now, they want us to vote now/COVID-19 is the stamp on the dope now.”
But Westside Gunn deserves credit for his Kanye-like ability to seamlessly work anyone into his world. The best example of this is a pair of Slick Rick features, which Gunn treats carefully. Each verse is slotted at the end of their respective tracks, for maximum reverence. On “Ocean Prime,” following an overly intense Busta Rhymes, the beat becomes slightly less busy and draws you in, as if Gunn’s afraid you’ll miss a word of Rick’s verse. On both songs, Rick sounds ageless and sly; “Goodnight” is like the moment when a wrestling forefather makes their long-awaited return to Monday Night Raw.
Yet, as far as Westside Gunn projects go, the loops here are less memorable and consistent than his better records (see: Pray for Paris and Flygod). Tracks like Daringer and Beat Butcha’s “The Butcher and the Blade” and “Ishkabibble’s” are fine, but they sound like leftovers from Kool G Rap’s 4,5,6 that have been cleaned up and polished—they could use some mud. Daringer and Beat Butcha are responsible for seven of the 11 tracks, and they make up for the few misfires with splashes of greatness, like “Lessie,” which includes a nostalgia-invoking sample resembling an ice-cream truck jingle. But it’s these slight inconsistencies that separate the more successful Westside Gunn projects from the forgettable ones. Who Made the Sunshine falls somewhere in the middle, and doesn’t feel like it was devised to be anything more than what it is: another step toward the expansion of the Griselda Records brand.
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