A strong work ethic has never been a problem for G-Eazy, so maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise that in less than 18 months he followed up his breakthrough 2014 album, These Things Happen, with When It’s Dark Out, released late last year.
The current album — his first under a deal with RCA Records — arrived on Dec. 4, despite the fact that G-Eazy toured into the early months of 2015 behind These Things Happen and needed to include time for the manufacture and promotional setup of the new album — a process that can take a few months for a major label release.
“I don’t know how we did it,” G-Eazy says. “I guess just by not taking any days off. I went from the end of the last tour for the last album (straight) to the studio, just set up shop, locked the doors and put my phone on airplane mode and made the album.
“The sophomore album’s tough,” he continues, “because there’s a lot going on and it’s harder to find the time. Your schedule gets so crazy. But I wanted to do it right and I wanted to make it great, so I just worked my ass off.”
G-Eazy had good reason to push himself to make When It’s Dark Out. He had started to get nationwide notice with his 2011 mixtape, The Endless Summer, and saw his momentum build with Must Be Nice, a follow-up mixtape released in 2012. Then, when he released These Things Happen in June 2014, it debuted at No. 3 on Billboard’s album chart — an impressive showing for an album that was independently released (although it was distributed by RED, one of the industry’s leading distributors).
Now G-Eazy (whose real name is Gerald Gillum) is being touted as a candidate to be Hip Hop’s next superstar, with hit singles and his current headlining tour of major arenas.
G-Eazy’s ascension didn’t happen by magic. That aforementioned work ethic played a key role in getting him to the cusp of stardom. Raised by a single mother in San Francisco’s Bay Area, in high school, G-Eazy joined a local Hip Hop group, The Bay Boyz, which posted songs on MySpace and tried to develop a presence nationally. But after getting his diploma, G-Eazy chose to go to college, enrolling at Loyola University in New Orleans, where he majored in music industry studies.
It was during college that G-Eazy, now 27, began releasing a steady stream of mixtapes. One of his early tracks, “Candy Girl,” became a MySpace hit and attracted the interest of RCA. The flirtation did not lead to a record deal at that point, and an undeterred G-Eazy returned to college, putting out four more mixtapes before he released The Endless Summer.
That was when he really started to make waves nationally. His updated version of Dion’s 1961 hit, “Runaround Sue,” generated more than 4 million YouTube views, and The Endless Summer gained widespread acclaim for the way G-Eazy built his tracks and his raps around ’50s/early-’60s-era Doo Wop and Rock & Roll samples, crafting a unique blend of retro and modern.
“I like to bridge gaps, bring different worlds together,” G-Eazy says. “So for me, sampling ’50s music, half time on the drums and rapping over it, it was a crazy contrast.”
The success of “Runaround Sue” coupled with the grassroots following he built while touring played a key role in the impact These Things Happen made upon his release.
He also started to get considerable attention for his looks (he’s often compared to film idol James Dean) and his sharp sense of style. But his music has always been G-Eazy’s biggest selling point.
With These Things Happen, he started to move away from the retro element, and on When It’s Dark Out, any traces of that style are pretty much gone. To G-Eazy, though, it only made sense to evolve his sound.
“I think it was important as a creative (artist), with every project or body of work you set out to put together, to push yourself and move forward, take risks,” he says. “You can’t reheat the same soup forever.”
When It’s Dark Out is an unusually musical and melodic Hip Hop album. For instance, “Me, Myself & I” is built around Rexha’s striking, beautiful guest vocal, while “Drifting” (featuring Chris Brown) and “Nothing To Me” (with Keyshia Cole and E-40) are silky ballads with mostly sung vocals. G-Eazy says he didn’t necessarily set out to give the album such a melodic dimension, but he feels it’s a valuable component of the songs.
“Music makes you feel something. Like a melody can convey emotion,” he says. “It’s just the way I hear music, the way I make music.”
G-Eazy also steps up his game lyrically, showing a personal and vulnerable side in a few songs in lieu of clichéd braggadocio. There are lyrics, like on “One of Them” or “Order More,” about living the big life of a Hip Hop star, but the songs “Drifting” and “Sad Boy” find G-Eazy contemplating the downsides and insecurities of fame, such as being separated from friends and family and questioning whether friends like him only because of his success.
On “Everything Will Be OK,” he recalls real-life difficulties, including those involving his mother — when she left his father, weathering times when she was unemployed, understanding her sexuality and discovering the body of his mother’s girlfriend, who had suffered a fatal overdose.
G-Eazy says the latter event was a story he had rarely shared.
“It’s tough to open up,” he says. “Like I told a story on ‘Everything Will Be OK’ that I hadn’t even told some of my closest friends, something I never really talk about. So to talk about it on an actual song and then release it to the whole world, it was kind of scary. The thing is, it’s like when you’re honest with yourself, and when you’re honest (in lyrics), it can be therapeutic to open up.”
Proud of his latest work, G-Eazy says When It’s Dark Out will be the focus of his live show this summer.
“I kind of put the album together in a similar way I would put a show together, like in terms of a set list, just energy-wise, keeping the dynamic,” he says. “So I’ll play most of the new album and of course I’ll do some of the favorites off of the last one.”
G-EAZY performs Sunday at Riverbend with Logic, Yo Gotti, YG and P. Reign. Tickets/more info: riverbend.org.
This article appears in Jul 27 – Aug 3, 2016.
