Reigning from the city where Gogo music, Nike boots, Solbiato sportwear, and politics outshine the seemingly invisible hip-hop scene, the DMV area is still managing to produce a diverse collection of rappers.
With Wale as the city’s official hip-hop ambassador and rappers like Fat Trel carrying the city’s crime-riddled trap culture on his back, DC is slowly emerging as a hip-hop hot box.
Somewhere in between Wale’s poetic riddles and Fat Trel’s nuance narratives of DC’s street life, lies G-Two.
Born and raised in Bladensburg, Maryland, a neighborhood bordering DC’s northeast corridor, G-Two is offering another perspective of life in the DMV.
Conscious yet impassive, G-Two rhymes with a dual narrative.
G-Two’s music is street, but somehow, the 24-year-old rapper manages to avoid the tech-toting trend many hip-hop newcomers have adopted.
Raised by a single mother, G-Two, whose real name is Ronald Gathers II (hints G-Two), fell in love with hip-hop during the days of its complex simplicity.
His admiration of hip-hop prompted a young G-Two to memorize an endless amount of rhymes by writing down the witty verses of Bone Thugs and the vigilant alliterations of Eminem – line-by-line, bar-for-bar.
Sonically, G-Two’s music isn’t indicative of his DMV upbringing.
Because of DC’s interesting geographical location lying between Maryland’s western border and Virginia’s Potomac River, G-Two’s musical influence ranges from the raw, gritty, sound of New York hip-hop, to the slow, trippy beats of the south, and of course, DC’s own cultural enclaves.
Besides G-Two’s mentions of “bammas” and other DC slang, indicators of his District influence are somewhat sparse.
Aware of DC’s struggle to establish itself as a force in hip-hop, G-Two considers himself the bridge between what DC’s been missing: balance.
When it comes to his fellow DMV rappers, G-Two admits that it was once taboo to “like” Wale in the District, but now the “Can’t Get Enough” rapper is rooting for his fellow DMV comrade to take the place they both call home to the top.
G-Two has also collaborated with DC’s new rising star Fat Trel, who recently released his well-received Nightmare On E Street mixtape.
After releasing four mixtapes, G-Two’s hard work is finally paying off with his latest offering, Trillmatic.
Inspired by Nas and UGK, G-Two describes Trillmatic as a conscious yet trill body of work, stating:
“Art doesn’t have to have one facet, it can have a multitude. For me there are two – Trill-Matic.”
Although DC seems like a non-factor as a national musical enclave, with Wale, Fat Trel, and G-Two in the streets, the District’s rap narrative is becoming more compelling one rhyme at a time.
G-Two recently released his mixtape Trillmatic, which is available for download here.
Learn more about G-Two here.
