Every country has a dark side. Countless humans journey to new homes every year in the search of a perfect destination — eternal peace on the beaches of Thailand, artistic fulfillment by the streets of Italy, spiritual awakenings in the ashrams of India, or financial freedom within the cities of America. While a subset may find these hopes come to fruition, many will become distraught and disillusioned by false promises of happiness and systemic barriers to success. OutKast channels the anger that comes from this disillusionment on “Gasoline Dreams”, the opener off their fourth studio album Stankonia, a scathing and vitriolic cut that exposes the failings of the place we call home.

“Gasoline Dreams” by OutKast

Hip-Hop duo OutKast, formed by southern hip-hop artists Big Boi and André 3000, rose to prominence in the 90s with their debut album, 1994's Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik, and two back-to-back classics, 1996’s ATLiens and 1998’s Aquemini. These albums revolutionized the musical landscape by bringing southern hip-hop to mainstream respect and acclaim, mixing themes of human struggle and surreal existentialism, and injecting hip-hop with the sounds of psychedelic rock, gospel, and jazz. The combination of Big Boi’s slick and clever rapping and André 3000’s eclectic and socially conscious storytelling captivated and enthralled audiences, and set them up for worldwide greatness as they entered the new millennium.

While their first three albums carried a distinctive laid-back feel, 2000’s Stankonia represented a conscious shift in musical ethos that paralleled the turn of the new millennium.

In the November 2000 issue of College Media Journal New Music Monthly, Jon Caramanica interviewed André and Big Boi about the inspiration behind this change.

[André 3000]: “It’s just real chaotic times and kids right now just don’t know what to do. Nowadays you got different drugs on the scene. [Ecstasy] just hit the hood. It ain’t [weed] no more. They on some other speed-up type s***. Some of them on blow, little kids snorting cocaine, so that’s why the tempo, the tempo had to get a lot faster.” [Big Boi]: “N****s living this life at a fast speed don’t know what’s going on around them. If you live fast, you gonna come out of here real fast, so the music need to show that.” [André 3000]: “To me, songs like B.O.B. [on Stankonia] — that’s the heartbeat of what’s going on right now.”

This frenetic and tragic energy is captured throughout the album (“Ms. Jackson”, “B.O.B”, “Xplosion”, “?”) as Stankonia ambitiously experiments with rock, funk, techno, psychedelia, and electronica along with righteously disregarding traditional song structure. This groundbreaking approach to music creation, which inspired groundbreaking artists like Kanye West and Kendrick Lamar, encapsulates the confusion and strangeness that comes from what feels like a new world order — one where many of us feel left behind.

“Gasoline Dreams” roars out the gate with distorted rock-tinged electric guitar chords, a raging and maniacal drum beat, and high-pitched synths to create a chaotic and wrathful musical atmosphere that is almost apocalyptic in nature. André 3000 emerges from this atmosphere, stone-cold and vindictive, to call out his country for its hypocrisies, injustices, and moral posturing.

“Don’t everybody like the smell of gasoline? / Well burn muthaf***a burn American dreams / Don’t everybody like the taste of apple pie? / We’ll snap for yo’ slice of life I’m tellin’ ya why / I hear that Mother Nature now’s on birth control / The coldest pimp be looking for somebody to hold / The highway up to Heaven got a crook on the toll / Youth full of fire ain’t got nowhere to go, nowhere to go”

With this hook, André embraces rage, angst, and disillusionment into an empowering and thought-provoking call. André cleverly flips common American motifs — the American Dream, Apple Pie, and Christian Theology — to underscore the ways the nation has failed marginalized communities and the growing youth. These lines drip with biting satire about the so-called promises of the American Dream that often serve the people already in power which in turn has led to a lack of empathy for those struggling in this country.

André knows this struggle all too well.

“All of my heroes did dope / Every n**** ‘round me playing married, or paying child support / I can’t cope, never made no sense to me one day I hope it will”

André starts the first verse of the album acknowledging the ways the cards have been stacked against him since birth. In his hometown of Atlanta, Georgia, he witnessed a prevalence of drugs, violence, and financial hardship without any support from those with the power to help.

The echo that punctuates each of André’s fast-paced bars allows him to show his disgust and distraught for all the issues he is bringing to light. Continuing with the enraged vocal delivery from the hook into his verse, along with this despondent echo, André seems to wonder how hope can ever manifest for him and his children after multiple lifetimes of oppression and struggle.

His partner-in-crime Big Boi may have an answer to that question.

“It’s s***ty like Ricky Stratton got a million bucks / My cousin Ricky Walker got ten years doing Fed time / On a first offense drug bust, f*** the Holice / That’s if ya racist or ya crooked /… A couple of months ago they gave OutKast the key to the city / But I still gotta pay my taxes and they give us no pity / About these youngsters amongst us / You think they respect the law / They think they monsters, they love us, reality rappin’ / And giving the youth the truth from this booth / And when we on stage we scream / Don’t everybody, everybody”

With a hardened vocal delivery, Big Boi opens his verse citing concrete examples of disproportionate punishments due to racism and corruption. He goes on to recount that even when people from black and brown communities make it to the tip-top of success, they are still vilified by so many other communities and institutions. This pattern has led Big Boi to recognize that the youth has lost faith in the supposed role models of the nation.

Yet he uses the last few lines to give us a glimmer of hope in a song otherwise filled with depressing realities and the bitter taste of inequality. With these ending bars that ever-so-slightly dip into calmer vocal territory, Big Boi highlights the purpose of anger. OutKast may have seen a lifetime of unfair treatment, but they have now dedicated their careers to uplifting the spirits of the disenchanted and downtrodden youth. They are using their anger not to wallow in victimhood but instead to start the spark of societal change.

When we start with awareness of the problems around us, we can begin the multi-generational process of moving towards progress and peace. While festering in resentment without any direction can lead to a life of apathy and a lack of agency, a bit of anger can act as a catalyst for real change — the same anger that has spurred activists like Rosa Parks and Greta Thunberg.

As we move into the next decade and face a host of both old and new issues, our frustrations can transform into societal advancement if we can point them in the right direction with the right support. With enough time, we can only hope for a day when our anger subsides and peace of mind replaces it — and we move from never-ending disillusionment to the dawn of hope, from the splintering of communities to the shifting tides of unity, from battle-withered cynicism to hard-fought optimism.

And the dark side of our nation begins to shine.