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I'm from the South, ain't got no accent, don't know why Childish Gambino – Bonfire
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While he was raised in Georgia, he has lived in NYC and Cali for nearly 10 years.

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Jordan Griffith
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2 years

There’s actually another play on words here where he’s highlighting southern slang of using double negatives. “Aint got no accent”, is him using the accent in the song itself as an extra, deeper punchline.

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Default_avatar_100

11

9 years

If you can even understand what I’m saying…..I thought he meant that he didn’t know he had an accent.In the terms that being raised in the south,he has a southern accent;southern accents don’t sound very normal to non southerners

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Tell me how I suck again, my memory is hazy Childish Gambino – Bonfire
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A bit of playful irony here. Childish knows that he’s awesome, so he’s trying to elicit bullshit from his critics.

This is a throwback to one of his sketches with Derrick Comedy on youtube, called “Memory Loss”. In it, he plays a brain-damaged man who forgets what dicks look like.

Also, this line comes right after he mentioned that he was told he was awful – his memory is so hazy he needs to be told that why he sucks again right after the first time being told… ‘cause there isn’t any point in trying to remember irrelevant facts.

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4af5c96e8b0ebfb1257ad61a6e0791e8

277

2 years

always thought this line was him answering his own question. I thought he sucked because his memory is hazy lol

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5e0f7b145fd7a4278a5cfd159bf4944b

205

4 years

I feel like i’m chatting out my ass but he could be saying that hazy, lemon haze the weed strand, and you suck the blunt/bong or whatever and then weed destroys ur memory maybe?

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6 years

With the line he also refers to how often he is told that he sucks. Similar to the response, “speak up, I didn’t hear you” when someone is talking trash.

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These rappers don't know what to do Childish Gambino – Bonfire
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The game just can’t figure out Childish Gambino, because he’s just too different from anything that they’ve seen before.

He’s an underdog, challenging other rappers, who don’t know what to do with him. He is like a train coming at them in full speed. CG released this song as a single before Camp was released, and this was his first album on a major record label.

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Yeah, I'm in her ass like sodomy
So if you see my hand under the table, don't bother me Childish Gambino – Bonfire
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Very clever, but also a little disconcerting from the guy who said, “Girls who willingly do butt stuff but weren’t molested don’t exist.”

It should be noted that Troy, Donald’s character on Community, “has a thing for "butt stuff”. Also on the show, when asked to do an experiment which he will be paid for, he asked:

Do they do stuff to your butt?
No.
Do you get paid more if they do stuff to your butt?

The second part is pretty obvious as well, don’t bug Donald when he’s got his hand under the table, because he’s probably fingering some girl or masturbating.

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'Cause all I did was act me, like a Looney Tune Childish Gambino – Bonfire
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“Act me” is a homophone for “ACME”, the fictional company that supplies all kinds of shit in the Looney Tunes. All Childish does is be himself like a Looney Tune.

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Edb7f5bffaae6f7fdcbf23bafa754144

108

4 years

I think the lyrics are “act mean” Lots of the Loony Tune characters are mean to each other like how Bugs is manipulative and Daffy yells a lot and gets angry easily (like CG in this song)

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You know these rapper dudes talk shit, start killin'
Fuck that, got goons like an archvillain Childish Gambino – Bonfire
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The rap game can get violent, because a lot of rappers are affiliated with violent criminal organizations, whose members can be referred to as “goons”. A common trope in a lot of movies and TV shows is for the protagonist’s archvillain to have an army of violent underlings at his disposals, also called goons.

Same concept, right?

Also, Gambino calls his fans Goons.

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1 year

This may be a reference to MF DOOM the “Archvillain”. DOOM would rap about non violence and not telling about your business. DOOM tended to rap about non violence in response to his brother dying, and Gambino wants to follow in the footsteps of the great MF DOOM

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gambino
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4 years

in contrast to other rappers who personally kill people, gambino says “fuck that” -because he has enough power to have his goons do the killing for him.

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Eatin' Oreos like these white girls that blow me Childish Gambino – Bonfire
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Oreo is the cookie that we all loved to snack on as a kid, but it’s also a derogatory term thrown at suburban black kids for not fitting certain stereotypes (Like Mr. Gambino here)–black kids who act white. So now girls that give him blowjobs are “eatin' an Oreo.” Get it?

Also, his dick is black but filled with white cream filling (sperm). Just like an Oreo.

Note that “white girl” and “blow” are both slang for cocaine.

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2 years

white people love Oreos

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4 years

He could also be referring to being called an “Oreo”, or a black person who acts white

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Default_avatar_100

72

6 years

I think there is still more to this, because this could also mean how some people would split it open and lick of the “white cream” off of the black cookie (if you know what I mean)

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164127ab59161da4e39577d78414cd1d

2,011

6 years

This line has so many fucking interpretations, absolute genius

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6 years

“Eating Oreos like these white girls that blow me” could also be a reference to getting a blow job from a white girl. His legs are black and the white girl is in between his legs, like how an Oreo has black cookies on the outside and cream in the middle

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I sound weird like "nigga" with a hard 'R' Childish Gambino – Bonfire
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Childish is referring to a bit from his own stand-up routine (under the name Donald Glover), where he tells a joke about how in high school, if he said “nigger” instead of “nigga” to other black kids at his school, they’d do a double-take because he sounded “weird,” like a white kid was saying it.

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Gambino is a call girl, fuck you, pay me Childish Gambino – Bonfire
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The phrase “Call girl” is a euphemism for a prostitute, whose job description is to fuck people and get paid for it.

Could also be a reference to Pinky’s mixtape because some people might call her a call girl.

“Fuck you, pay me” is also a line from Kanye West’s “Two Words”.

The phrase “fuck you, pay me” originated in the 1990 gangster film Goodfellas.

Business bad? Fuck you, pay me. Oh, you had a fire? Fuck you, pay me. Place got hit by lightning, huh? Fuck you, pay me.

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C656d59432cd550719b82f1c74ac44f8

1,513

3 years

Dude this line is so smooth

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6c5f5ab0675c712967b26046813d007e

744

8 years

The line is also referencing the people who hate him. They do something like say he’s a call girl, and his response of ‘Fuck you, pay me’ is like yea so what if you’re right? You still owe me this much respect.

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Switch (The Science Project) Lupe Fiasco – Switch (The Science Project)
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In the song Switch, Lupe runs an “Experiment” during which he lays out for the listeners several different facets or niches that all rappers tend to fall into. Every time the background says “Switch”, Lupe will change the flow, meter, cadence, vocab, and topic to correspond to another niche of rap.

1st Switch-Slow, soothing style (eg. Snoop Dogg)
2nd Switch-One word style
3rd Switch-Intimidation
4th Switch-Twist Rapping (eg. Twista)
5th Switch-Gangsta Rap (eg. 50 Cent)
6th Switch-Conscious Rap (eg. Common)
7th Switch-Materialistic Rap (eg. Soulja Boi)
8th Switch-Working Man Rap (eg. Immortal Tech)

After laying it all out there in the 1st and 2nd verses, Lupe just goes crazy on the 3rd verse, switching between styles nearly every other bar, but he reverses the order in which he goes through each style

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