People had always called me Lil’ Gucci or Gucci’s son, so it seemed like a good fit to take on my father’s moniker. As for the release, I titled it Str8 Drop Records Presents: Gucci Mane LaFlare.
Str8 Drop was a crew I’d formed with my partner Whoa. It wasn’t a label as much as a group of niggas from my hood who were rapping. OJ was a part of this crew.
Al put me onto a place in the city that printed me a thousand CDs, posters, and postcards for Gucci Mane LaFlare and I hit the streets of East Atlanta hard with it. I was already a hell of a salesman and I worked my music into my day-to-day hustle, selling niggas a package deal for a dime of smoke and a CD. I would front copies to my homeboys and let them keep a couple of dollars for every CD they sold. It wasn’t long after I printed up those first thousand CDs that I was almost out of stock.
At that point I arrived at a crossroads. Was I going to re-up on Gucci Mane LaFlare and try to move another thousand copies or was I going to figure out something else? My next move would be a pivotal one, one of the smartest decisions I made in my early music career.
I brought the last of my CDs, posters, and postcards to the bootleggers on the Westside of Atlanta by the Oakland City train station. I explained I was an up-and-coming artist out of the Eastside and that I was trying to get exposure for my music outside of my neighborhood.
“I need you guys to sell the hell out of this CD,” I told them. “Whatever money that you get from it, it’s yours.”
“You sure?” they asked.
I assured them I was. To sweeten the deal, they printed me a few thousand duplicate copies of Gucci Mane LaFlare and posters for free, which I sold for two or three dollars a pop—all profit. More important, though, my music was now being pushed all throughout the state of Georgia.
VII
* * *
THE ZONE 6 CLIQUE
One day I was putting up my posters outside of Jazzy T’s, a strip club on Columbia Drive on the Eastside, when I was approached by a dude who introduced himself to me as Red. Like me, Red was a rapper from East Atlanta and he knew my music. He’d heard my album and admired my hustle. We chopped it up, exchanged numbers, and agreed to meet up and work on music together.
Red and I became fast friends. We soon formed a group we named the Zone 6 Clique. The cornerstone of the Zone 6 Clique was a pledge to be self-sufficient, independent artists. We took pride in the fact that we were hustlers first and foremost. We had money and didn’t need to sign to some label and get jerked over. This was a self-financed operation. Using profit from our dealings in the streets, we would fund and promote our own projects. But rapping wasn’t yet my priority.
My whole crew from Sun Valley was made up of hustlers, but Red and the rest of the Zone 6 Clique were on another level. Nearly everyone in the group was older than me. My game was petty compared to the shit they were up to. I was still picking up slabs of dope. They were getting powder by the kilo and cooking it up in trap houses. I was still a neighborhood corner hustler, slinging sacks. They were taking statewide trips, moving serious weight.
More than hustlers, they were robbers who targeted hustlers. They were robbing niggas for their stash and hitting big-time licks. They wouldn’t think twice about taking someone’s money on consignment—we’re talking up to a hundred thousand dollars—and just saying “Fuck it” and driving off with no intention of paying anyone back. They didn’t give a fuck about the consequences of pulling moves like that. They were more than willing to deal with them. Their whole attitude was bring it on.
It wasn’t long before I was doing the same shit. Finessing people out of their money came naturally. It was in my genes. I knew whom I could short and whom I had to give extra to. I knew whom I could give some bullshit to and tell them it was good. I could sense if someone was weak or scared. I could feel it and use it to my advantage. I worked every move I could.
Hit a lick for ’bout 50 stacks
Niggaz trippin’ talkin’ ’bout Gucci bring the money back
I rapped that line in a song called “Lawnmower Man.” It’s a line that got me notoriety in my hood. Because it was true. Niggas couldn’t believe I had the balls to talk about that incident on a track and it fortified my reputation as a rapper and a robber.
I started breaking into houses too. Not looking for TVs or jewelry or anything like that. I was after money and drugs exclusively. I’d target those whom I’d previously shopped with, and after gaining their trust I’d hide out and wait for them to leave their stash house before breaking in. If I couldn’t find it, I’d just sit in the house and wait for their return. Then I’d make them give it up. I quickly adopted the attitude of my new crew.
I accumulated enemies fast. My prey was my own hood. Even my closest friends from Sun Valley started distancing themselves after I aligned myself with the Zone 6 Clique, and those were not some soft niggas. They were superstreet too but they didn’t condone robbing and tricking people out of their work. I’d bring my new crew around and they’d be looking at my buddies from Sun Valley like they were a steak. I kept them off them but that was only because I was targeting them for myself. At one point I even ended up taking BP’s stash, and he was one of my best friends. That only alienated me from those guys even more. I’d become a slimy dude. My appetite had become insatiable.
In keeping up with my new partners I expanded my hustle beyond East Atlanta. I started going to cities, towns, and trailer park communities all over Georgia: Savannah, Milledgeville, Augusta, Sandersville, LaGrange, Brunswick, Thomson.
I also started taking regular trips to my home state of Alabama. I made that two-hour drive so many times. Sometimes twice in the same day because I’d moved the pack so quickly.
I didn’t care for being back in Alabama. Ever since I’d gotten a taste of city life in Atlanta the country bored the hell out of me. Sitting around a fire, eating pig’s feet, drinking, and shooting the breeze was not my idea of a good time. Everything in Alabama moved too slow. Everything, that is, except the money. The place was a damn gold mine.
?
Like Atlanta, the demand for drugs in Alabama was high, but unlike in the city there was a limited supply. For me that meant less competition and higher margins. The street value of everything was almost double what I’d make in Atlanta. So when I would show up in Birmingham with a couple of pounds of weed and half a ki of dope in tow, it was like Nino Brown was in town. I was bringing city ambition to these rural towns. A lot of these country-ass niggas had never seen anything like it.
My cousins in Bessemer trapped, so I made a good chunk of change in Alabama just off serving them. This was easy money but it brought problems. Inevitably my Alabama family discovered what I was up to. I was staying with my cousin Suge when my aunt Jean found the four pounds of weed I’d brought with me.
“Whose is this?!” she screamed. “What are you bringing into my house?!”