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At around 3:10 in Snowgoons Get Off the Ground (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yih_bMc5B7o), Ruste Juxx starts rapping. Why is his portion accompanied by heavy breathing?

Here are the associated lyrics (taken from genius: https://genius.com/Snowgoons-get-off-the-ground-lyrics)

Machine gun skunk I blow dolo
That's why your bitch jocked me like Polo
I ain't gotta go get it cause I got it on me
I smell like palm trees, nothing but exotic on me
Hoes get erotic on me, I put the pipe down
Stick the pipe in her mouth tell her pipe down
Now lick a shot for niggas doing life inside
Grabbing you by the neck, sticking the knife inside
It's B-R-double-O-K, double A-K brining trouble your way
Knock niggas out, they can't get off the ground
Shell cases found, the cops get off the ground
So put a muzzle on that bi-suiter rap shit
Nigga knuckle up, cock rugers back bitch
Ruste Juxx bullets blow out your brain
Think it's a game, listen to Lil' Fame

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  • Not sure I follow - are you asking about the music itself, or the lyrics? How do you think that that changes the interpretation? – EJoshuaS - Stand with Ukraine Oct 31 '17 at 13:47
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    Could you post the lyrics associated with the heavy breathing? There might be some association... (Note: there is a precedent for breathing as literature. One of Samuel Beckett's famous short plays consists of no words, but only a cry and a breath: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breath_(play) ;) – DukeZhou Oct 31 '17 at 19:41
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    I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it's about the performance of a piece of music, and not about literature (including song lyrics) as such. – Rand al'Thor Nov 01 '17 at 12:06

1 Answers1

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Based on the lyrics (supplied via an edit, but pending approval)

  • I'd say the use of breathing has double meaning, indicating the convolution of sex and death

The Death Drive is a concept deriving from Freudian theory, proposed by Sabina Spielrein in her paper "Destruction as the Cause of Coming Into Being". From the wiki:

"The death drive opposes Eros, the tendency toward survival, propagation, sex, and other creative, life-producing drives."

The full text Dr. Spielrein's paper can be found here. [Journal of Analytical Psychology, 1994]

At a very high level, it has to do with a desire to re-enact traumas, and the idea that erotic, as well as violent, inclinations can originate in trauma.

The lyrics are almost a textbook example of the conflation of violence and eroticism:

Hoes get erotic on me, I put the pipe down
Stick the pipe in her mouth tell her pipe down
Now lick a shot for niggas doing life inside
Grabbing you by the neck, sticking the knife inside
SOURCE: Metrolyrics

Note that double meanings are heavily utilized: "pipe" initially means weed pipe but subsequently the male sexual organ; "lick a shot" uses firearms vocabulary in conjunction with ejaculation; "grabbing you by the neck" in this context refers not only to murder by strangulation, but erotic asphyxiation; "knife" refers both to a stabbing weapon and the male sexual organ.

  • the breathing sounds indicate excitement, which could be erotic, set against the crunky (dark) production and violent imagery of the lyrics

See Also: Oprah, Carl Jung, and a Remarkable Essay about Sex and Death

DukeZhou
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