Insufficient Funds: Childish Gambino - Culdesac

Insufficient Funds is a weekly post in which we feature a free, or very close to it, piece of media that you can enjoy without overdrafting your bank account. So if you're low on funds, stay tuned to Cerebral Pop every Friday morning.

While I would probably never cite rap as one of my favorite genres, I've been known to enjoy it on a few select occasions. The biggest problem I usually have with it is not being able to relate to most of the subject matter at all. So many giant egos rapping about girls and clubs and having pissing matches with other large, muscle-y men whose sides I will never take. I'm a white, mid-20s male, married with a kid, and a huge boner for all forms of media that I will never even hope to create on my own. So, it makes sense that the only rap I enjoy is the stuff that isn't written with the traditional genre conventions in mind: mc chris, Saul Williams, and now, Childish Gambino, the rap-persona of Community star Donald Glover.

It's easy for cynical people to assume he must be joking by putting out a rap album, but I imagine it was always a fantasy sitting in the back of his head. If I was a successful TV star with all sorts of creative people surrounding me, I'd probably take advantage of it by using those resources to help me achieve any tiny whim of an idea I'd ever had. So it makes sense that Donald Glover used some of his free time to complete what was probably one of his childhood dreams all along.

There is definitely passion in these songs, even if a lot of the lyrics are about slightly ridiculous things like writing scripts with Tina Fey. He knows the whole thing will seem weird to people. Hell, a lot of the songs have lyrics about how stupid people will think he is for doing this whole music thing. It's something that makes his music kind of endearing for me, but you might find it annoying. Either way, you can easily find out because his album just happens to be completely free. Click over here to download it for free, or listen to some of my favorite tracks first.

Hero by Childish Gambino

Got This Money by Childish Gambino

The Last by Childish Gambino