Lucki is shameless about his pain. Whether the 22-year-old Chicagoan—born Lucki Camel Jr.—is rapping about his bouts with depression and anxiety, his role in sabotaging his romantic relationships, or his prescription drug addiction, he refuses to hide his flaws. His candor about his life lows has made him a relatable antihero to a loyal cult following of fans who regularly take to social media with comments like, “Lucki changed my life” or “Lucki gets me” whenever he releases new music or opens up about his struggles publicly. He is an avatar for his fans’ sadness and songs like “@Night” and “Peach Dream” are snapshots of the life of a troubled young rapper who has been within arm’s reach of stardom for years but, because of his demons, has never fully embraced it.
Back in 2013, Lucki—then known as Lucki Eck$—was supposed to be the next big thing out of Chicago. Chief Keef had already made his mark as the face of a burgeoning drill scene, Chance the Rapper was anointed the softer-edged and more easily accessible alternative to drill’s street-inflected sound, and the then-16-year-old Lucki existed somewhere in between. His “alternative trap” sound was typified by his breakout single “Count on Me” which paired clever metaphor and simile-laced rhymes about drug-dealing with a woozy backdrop of a beat produced by Hytman. “Count on Me” and its dreamy, slow-motion music video received co-signs from the likes of Justin Timberlake and Pharrell. The subsequent Alternative Trap mixtape was a further introduction to Lucki’s sedated, dry-voiced flow—a flow that was the prototype for the narcotized vocal styles that became the hallmark of so-called SoundCloud rap years later. But, despite all the exposure, Lucki’s mental health struggles and drug habit at the time slowed his momentum, causing him to take a break from music in late 2016.
Lucki also became a first-time father that year. In preparation for the birth of his son and motivated by the desire to be a good dad, he tried to come to terms with his addiction. Lucki officially returned from his eight-month-long hiatus from music with his decidedly self-aware project, Watch My Back. The tape drew inspiration from another artist who struggled with drug addiction and complicated emotions—Future. “Getting high really affected my music and my relationships,” Lucki says. “And Future helped me understand what I was going through.” During Future’s Monster to DS2 run, the Atlanta rapper perfected his use of music as an outlet to detail the effect drugs had on his relationships and his development as a human being. A lifelong student of the art form, Lucki took note: “I had to be relatable and really put my life out there like Future,” he says. “I know getting high is bad, but Future made me feel like we were all in this together, and I wanted people to feel about me how I feel about Future.”
Now, after crafting a bleaker sound and leaning even further into his own truths, Lucki is preparing to release his long-awaited project Freewave 3 in February. The project focuses on a year in Lucki’s life as he navigates love, heartbreak, and struggles with addiction, all while acclimating himself to new surroundings in New York City.
Lucki: [Laughs] I was in love.
Shit was just so cool, bro. We was together for like a year and a half. Like really whipped up together, getting money together. It was all fun. But the problem with that shit was just me. When you get high and [go through] withdrawal and shit, it can make you just become a really bad person. You end up taking it out on the people that love you and they really can’t be around you.
Yeah. Like I’m pretty much a good person. I got a son, he just turned two and I had a good dad growing up, so I am [being one] too. It’s just that I be getting high.
I needed to go home and be around real friends and shit. I was fucked up in the head. In New York, I was having withdrawals so bad and it took a toll on her. I didn’t deserve her, I was a super bad boyfriend. I grew up an only child so I was selfish and always wanted everything my way. But I was on tour [Days B4 Tour] when my heart broke. It didn’t really affect my performance but that’s when I really started appreciating the love from fan meet-and-greets and shit.
I would just get really sad [going from] state to state. And I would just wear it on my face. All the time you just gotta tell yourself to breathe and relax. But people knew something was wrong with me after when I went back home to Chicago. I was getting super high and that’s when I started making the second half of Freewave 3.
Yeah, the stuff I say about her on there is so real, bro. I guess the album is really about her. I even say her name in it! And it’s not like I wish it never happened—I made some of my best music from it. It’s funny though, I always used to get in trouble with girls for saying personal shit in the songs they would be like, “What the fuck, that’s OD personal?!”
It’s because when I got older I started listening to mad music like Future. I remember my mom put me onto Future when I was in like eighth grade, she had it on her iPod. I would listen to Future and get goosebumps for real. Sometimes kids tell me my music saved their life, that shit makes me feel so good, when I listen to [Future’s mixtape] Beast Mode I understand that feeling. That’s why I don’t like music about getting high from people that don’t [really use drugs], they’re trying to take advantage of a community.
It should be [that way]. I remember when I was talking to Earl [Sweatshirt] two or three years ago. He told me your perception is what you rap, your album should be outtakes of your life. It’s like you’re giving fans a life update.
People always say that but like I could be way more open on social media. Like I could be really on there talking about how my stomach hurts every day.
’Cause I get high and I get withdrawal [symptoms].
I’m getting high.
Look, I get high to replace a feeling. I wasn’t really getting high like this when I was in New York.
I didn’t need to, I was getting high off [of] love. Man, I just really loved that girl. I’ma wait around for her, I’ma get her back. No other girl, no matter how pretty, just doesn’t come near. I just gotta show her I can make music and do that shit, and not be selfish.
I don’t really play like that though. I don’t get high enough to die. I go through weeks or months where I’m binging and weeks or months when I’m good.
It’s hard for people to take accountability. Blaming yourself is not really taking accountability all the way, but it’s the first step. When a lot of relationships end it would be easy to be like, “Bro, fuck that bitch.” Some guys really still love their ex, and they can just be like, “Fuck her,” I can’t do that. By doing that you’re not just not taking accountability but being a bad person.
I’m not a simp, but I really do want people to know it’s OK to love bitches too. A lot of these niggas wasn’t really interacting with girls before they were rapping, talking all like, “Where the hoes at?” They feel like they’re all of a sudden entitled to girls. I did a lot of stupid shit in life, but nothing like that.
Freewave 3 is a whole year of my life. This is really the shit I’m gon’ get rich off! But I always be reminiscing and I always notice I’m always missing something. I be thinking that I don’t like a certain time period in my life, but then like a year later I’ll miss it. And I try not to think like that anymore because I was just stressing too much, in my feelings. I’m 22, I’m still learning how to be a better human. But those days of not stressing and not reacting poorly to change are coming. I don’t know how, or when, but I really believe it, you just can’t force it.
