Dissect - S10E6 - A BOY IS A GUN* by Tyler, The Creator

Episode Date: November 22, 2022

Our season-long analysis of IGOR continues with A BOY IS A GUN*. In the most sample heavy song on the album, Tyler uses a dichotomous gun symbol to express how his crush makes him feel: safe and in danger all at once. Shop Season 10 merchandise here. Follow us on TikTok, Instagram, and Twitter. Host, EP, Writer: Cole Cuchna Writer: Camden Ostrander Audio Editor: Kevin Pooler Theme Music: Birocratic Recreations: Andrew Atwood Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From Spotify, this is Dissect, long-form musical analysis broken into short digestible episodes. This is episode 6 of our season-long examination of Tyler the creator's Igor. I'm your host, Cole Kushner. Last time I dissect, we examined Igor's sixth track New Magic Wand. It was there we heard Tyler turn dark, as he imagined murdering his crushes girlfriend as the easy, magical solution to their problems. The so-called New Magic wand, his gun, was symbolic of Tyler's desperate attempt to wield power when feeling powerless. Tyler will develop this symbol further as Igor continues into its next track. The subject of our episode today, A Boy is a Gun.

A Boy is a Gun was written by Tyler Koma, with background vocals by Solange. Of all the songs on Igor, this track relies most heavily on samples, all of which are chopped from the 1961 song Bound by Ponderosa Twins Plus One. It's likely you recognize this song from its prominent use in Kanye West Bound 2 from a his album Yeezes. A thousand pictures, one good girl is worth a thousand bitches. Bam! Tyler actually has a relationship with Kanye's bound too, as he helped produce an early unused version of the track.

Known now as Bound One, this version leaked on the internet, after which Tyler tweeted, quote, Wow, original bound with my drums and bridge and chords and shit. Wow, so sick. This Bound One heavily samples another song called Aeroplane by We, and contains a passage with original drums and bass, which might be the part Tyler's tweet is referencing. Interestingly, this version of Bound doesn't contain the Ponderosa's soul sample at all. And based on his conversation with Rick Rubin, it seems that after Tyler heard Kanye's final Bound 2 with the sample, he went back and listened to Ponderosa's original Bound,

and found a section of the song he liked better than the sections sampled on Kanye's Bound 2. It was a song I was listening to, the song that I've kind of dealt with before. and I was like, man, I would do this differently. I would loop this part because this is the sweet spot. So I just looped it and came, just made my own new song structure out of this other song that I sampled from and kind of built around it. Were you sampling a song of your own? It's this other song called Bound. As Tyler mentioned here, he found a sweet spot in Bound that Kanye didn't sample, and thus the two songs sound pretty different.

despite pulling extensively from the same source. Specifically, Tyler samples three sections from bound, beginning with this stuttering instrumental break. For the verses, he grabs this lengthy section. Tyler pitches up these samples 1.5 semitones, effectively raising their tempo. There's also a third smaller sample heard periodically, where the vocalists harmonize on the word bound.

This is layered on top of the existing sample loop, which sounds like this together. While Tyler will add some original production elements later in the song. The majority of a boy is a gun relies on these samples with some added 808s to beef up the low end and of course Tyler's original melodies. It's so funny hearing the juxtaposition of the beautiful, melodious piano lines and the lyrics and the please don't shoot me down in the gunshots. Yeah, I love, again, I love the hard shit, pause, and I love the pretty shit.

No, we just try to mix them together. It makes it so much more interesting. Yeah, because you don't know what side you're on. Yeah. So the mesh is like, uh-huh. As Tyler just noted here, A Boy Is A Gun continues the musical dichotomy of beautiful and ugly we've tracked all season. This time, the sweet innocence of the soul samples and backing harmonies contrasts with

the violence of gunshots and Tyler's aggressive explicit lyrics, helping to portray his conflicting emotions in this dichotomous love-hate relationship. He begins repeating, don't shoot me down. It evokes the notion of being shot down or rejected when making it in advance, asking someone on a date, or asking someone to be your partner. Tyler gave his crush an ultimatum on New Magic Wand, demanding he pick him or the girl, and is now fearing rejection, equating the emotional pain of this with the physical pain of a gunshot wound.

Interestingly, it was Tyler holding the metaphoric gun to the head of his crush when demanding an answer on new magic wand. Yet here, Tyler's the one afraid, revealing what we suspected all along. The gun was a product of fear, a desperate attempt at emotional self-preservation. And when we introduce this level of danger or destruction, we often forget that we lack complete control over our emotions.

The tables can flip at any moment. Things can get beautiful or ugly really quick. The specific wording of Don't Shoot Me, down, also continues the descending or downward lyrical motif we've heard a handful of times now. On Earthquake, Tyler feared things crashing down, on I Think he was falling in love, and running out of time, he was drowning, pulled down to the deep end. Tyler's fear continues into the next line, you so motherfucking dangerous. It's another analogy in line with Earthquake, with Tyler once again articulating the threat of passion, its ability

to destroy us, to cause an injury of the heart. We also heard Tyler himself turn dangerous on new magic wand, exemplifying the ways love and the anxiety of heartbreak can transform us in terrifying ways, turn us into dangerous monsters. The way this line is phrased and performed, though, with bravado and repeated for emphasis, we get the sense that Tyler's attracted to the danger, perhaps drawn to the thrill and intense rush uniquely offered by high-risk endeavors. Tyler then continues, You Got Me By the Neck. This idiom, also phrased by the throat, means to have someone in a helpless position, to be in control of them, foreshadowing Igor's next track puppet. The imagery of the phrase evokes strangulation, and in this way we once again

find Tyler conveying the simultaneity of danger, attraction, and passion, as choking is an act of aggression, but also somewhat common during sex. To be held by the scruff of the neck is associated with dogs and puppies as well, perhaps relating back to the analogy of I will not fetch the ball from New Magic Wand. Despite Tyler's attempts to expel his crush's control, refusing to be his bitch, Here he's once again claiming to be subservient, a master's slave dynamic in line with the Igor archetype. Interestingly, this sort of imagery is often used for a parent animal holding their child, reminding us of the potential connections in Tyler's fears of abandonment. Tyler caps off the hook wrapping,

That's why these other N-words lame to us, because all these other N-words lame as fuck. We show him no respect. Consistent with his constant oscillation between insecurity and swagger, Tyler here admits the confidence he feels with the boy by his side, the gun on his hip. When together, when packing heat, he feels superior, invincible, and unthreatened. He looks down on others,

showing them no respect, subtly evoking the ways in which power is dependent on hierarchy. The phrasing of these lines, with the repeated use of the word lame, is almost certainly a nod to the opening line of Kanye's bound two. Tyler's nod to this now iconic opening line

is a subtle way of acknowledging that he sampled the same song. This is actually somewhat common in hip-hop, where a rapper will make it a point to cite or quote another artist as a way to pay homage and credit them for using the sample first. For example, the second half of Kendrick Lamar's Mad City heavily samples BB Kings, Chains and Things, which was also heavily sampled in Ice Cubes, a bird in the hand.

As a way to acknowledge this and pay respect, Kendrick quoted Ice Cub's verse from that song in his song. Fresh out of school because I was a high school grad. Got to get a chop because I was a high school. Another example of this comes in Pizzi's track 2 million up, which samples don't look any further by Dennis Edwards. This same song was famously sampled in both Junior Mafia and notorious BIG's Get Money Remix and Tupac's Hit Him Up.

PZ acknowledges this history in the opening line of his verse. In many cases, when using the same sample source as a pre-pac and hit him up, ain't a life. In many cases, when using the same sample source as a pre-existing hip-hop song, rappers will intentionally build on that song's theme. For instance, Kendrick built on Ice Cube's storytelling of his experience growing up in the streets of Los Angeles, and Peasy's Two Million Up is about setting a hit on a rival, building on the beef between Biggie and Pock that led to the respective deaths. And Tyler seems to be doing a similar move here,

as Kanye is bound to is a sort of love song that describes two somewhat contentious but passionate lovers attempting to work their way into a committed relationship. Now, in the background during the chorus, we hear harmonious vocals singing the song's title, A Boy is a Gun. This plainly stated metaphor draws on ideas of masculinity and weaponry, clearly highlighting the phallic symbolism of a gun and comparing it to a boy. In this way, it recalls Tyler's attempt on New Magic Wand to create a song that sounds like, and I quote, a hard dick, like, rar.

The song title itself, with an asterisk at the end, is an alteration of A Girl as a Gun, the title of a 1971 French film. Tyler spoke about this just before performing the song live for the first time. So I usually write down words or sentences that I think are cool. And like I'll be working on a beat and I'll think of one. And I'll just end up making a song from that. And this sentence is from a movie from the 70s, but it had girl in it. And I switched it to boy.

I was like, oh, that's a cool title. And I kind of just end up writing a song about that. And yeah, it's not super lyrical or crazy, but it's very, very personal, specific shit. And me and Solange did it in Lake Como. The film title, A Girl Is a Gun, refers to its femme fatale character that turns on the gunslinger protagonist of the film. In recent years, the phrase has been revived and flipped by feminists to promote their inherent power and even danger if not properly respected by society. The streetwear brand Pleasures featured the phrase on a shirt in 2017, famously worn by Playboy Cardi in the video for his first hit Magnolia. While Tyler will actually break down his own gun metaphor later in the song,

it does feel important to acknowledge up front that the change from girl to boy is consistent with Tyler's blurring of traditional and dated norms, stereotypes, and expectations around gender, in line with the androgyn of the Igor character and Tyler's own fluid sexuality. As was apparent on New Magic Wand, love or passion can be dangerous regardless of identity expression or sexual orientation. It's a universal dynamic shared among all of us living and loving humans. Following the chorus, we hear a brief post-chorus in which Tyler repeats, When the Time's Right, Baby, when the Time's Right.

Once again, the time motif reappears on the album. On the song Boyfriend, Tyler stated Time to be his most valuable possession and expressed that he gave his crush all the time that he could. This laid the foundation for running out of time, where Tyler sensed that time was running out to make his crush love him. Then on New Magic One, Tyler's violent ultimatum was inspired by him feeling like he was wasted his time on a relationship stuck in ambiguity and tired of the 60-40 split,

demanded 100% of his crushes time. Now in a bit of a twist, Tyler displays patience with the line, When the Time's Right Baby, when the Time's Right. While he attempted to aggressively be forced the issue on New Magic Wand, he now seems to put faith and fate, trusting that their time will come. And yet, as a boy as a gun continues into its first verse, Tyler immediately contradicts himself, as we again find him frustrated and impatient.

Tyler Take your hoodie off Why you hide your face for me Make your fucking mind up I am sick or waiting patiently How come you the best to me I know you the worst for me Tyler that sugar diabetic

To the first degree My spotty synchies Got me on the fences Whole squad and gins a travel bag By Balenci Big dog hitting big will is on the six speed Tyler begins The verse forcefully

Saying take your hoodie off Why you hide your hoodie off why you hide your face from me. We're immediately brought into a moment, with Tyler and his crush mid-fight. We can imagine his crush concealed in the shadows of the hood over his head. It's another obstruction between the two, frustrating Tyler who is attempting to communicate and connect.

The crush's hidden face is consistent with the mask motif attached to him, symbolic of his inability to express himself, to show his real self and live in the truth of his queerness. Tyler then issues yet another ultimatum, wrapping, make your fucking mind up, I'm sick of waiting patiently. We get some nice wordplay here, with sick corresponding to the patient and patiently, as in someone receiving treatment for a sickness. In this way, Tyler relates a twisted dependence on his crush, whereas crush is both the cause of the sickness and the cure for it. In other words, this relationship is not healthy.

This thread is developed in the ensuing lines, how come you're the best to me? I know you're the worst for me. Boy, your sweet as sugar, diabetic to the first degree. Tyler compares himself to a diabetic, someone whose body has difficulty processing sugar, which if left untreated can cause dangerously high blood sugar levels that damage your organs and even lead to coma or death. This danger is alluded to in Tyler's diabetic to the first degree, which seems to combine type 1 diabetes, the most severe and dangerous kind, with first degree murder. In other words, this relationship, this guy, is killing Tyler and he knows it, yet Tyler

can't get enough, can't stay away. He articulates this further rapping, My Spidey senses got me on the Fencees. Tyler plays with Spider-Man's supernatural powers to sense danger to his own intuition, which is telling him this relationship dynamic is threatening. This has him on the fensies, or on the fence, an idiom used when you can't make a decision. Tyler is unsure whether to stay or to go,

an emotional push-pull will feel throughout the entire song. He then ends the verse by pivoting to what feels like deflective boasts and escapist materialism, saying, in Ginza, Travel Bag by Balenci, Big Dog hitting big wheelies on the six speed. Tyler flexes that his whole crew is in Tokyo's famous shopping district, Ginza, where he copps a Balenciaga bag. On his Lucy track Okra, Tyler rapped about this same bag, revealing that it costs $30,000.

Tyler and his squad really did take a trip to Japan during the Flower Boy era, as confirmed by a a photo Tyler posted of him and his friends Jasper, Taco, Lionel, and Wyatt in 2018. The final line, Big Dog, hitting big wheelies on the six-speed, continues the vehicle motif, which is tied to the trip to Ginza and the Balenciaga travel bag. Hitting a wheelie is a showy move in line with Tyler flexing at the end of the verse. Now, a boy as a gun continues with the second iteration of its hook. While Tyler could have easily just copy and pasted the first hook, relying totally on the samples, He actually adds a new original piano to the mix,

providing just enough sonic variation to keep our ears interested. Also, if you listen closely to the tail end of the hook, you'll notice that Tyler changes the wording slightly. The first hook said, All these other end words lame as fuck, we show them no respect. On this chorus, you'll say, they show him no respect.

The change of this final line. they show him no respect is subtle, but clearly intentional. As we've tracked since running out of time, Tyler's crush is scared to take his mask off and commit to Tyler, partly because he fears the judgment from others about being in a relationship with a man. Throughout the album, Tyler has referred to these people with the non-specific they. On boyfriend, for instance, Tyler said, fuck what they said, and they don't understand. On running out of time, he said, stop lying for these N-words. These ideas also seem incorporated into this second hook of a boy as a gun, with Tyler

attempting to convince his crush that anyone who might judge and show him no respect is lame and shouldn't influence his life choices, his ability to be free. Now after this chorus, A Boy Is a Gun continues into another scathing verse. A verse will dissect right after the break. Welcome back to Dissect. Before the break, we approached A Boy Is a Gun's second verse, which once again finds Tyler talking directly to his crush, and we feel as if we're a fly on the wall eavesdropping on a real interaction. Oh, you passive, stress it. Oh, you're faking you're mad. Tyler, you better call you a cat. I ain't taking you home.

Yeah, I'm brushing you off. Because it's Parker is comb. You're my favorite garson, don't leave. Stay right here. Yeah, I want you right near. You invited me to breakfast. Why to fuck your ex here? But let's see if you round a god around this time next year.

Tyler begins addressing his crush. Oh, you passive aggressive. Oh, you faking you're mad. We're dropped into a middle of a fight with passive aggression, a loosely disguised, indirect expression of negative emotions. being consistent with the two's communication problems, continually dancing around their issues rather than confronting them directly. Tyler becomes a bit vindictive as he says, Oh, you want to go home? Cool, you better call you a cab. I ain't taking you home.

Continuing the constant setting of these two in a car together, Tyler's refusal to give his crush a ride home is once again him grasping for power when feeling powerless. He abandons him physically as a reaction to feeling abandoned emotionally, despite knowing the underlying feeling is hurt. If the car itself is a symbol of the relationship, Tyler pushing his crush out of the car is a threat of breaking things off, with his crush taking a cab, getting into another car, symbolic of them going their separate ways and their life paths diverging from each other, as opposed to the shared ride in the same vehicle.

Tyler then employs a bit of wordplay saying, I'm brushing you off because this parker is comb. You're my favorite garson. He plays with brushing off or dismissing someone in a clothes brush, used to clean his parker from com des garcin. This is a subtle callback to the Japan reference, as Com de Garsohn as the Japanese high-fashioned brand, like those you'd find in Ginza. But the reference gains to mention when we take a closer look at the brand in relationship to the

androgynous Igor character Tyler embodied for this album and tour. Combe de Garsohn was started by Japanese designer Ray Kawakubo in the 1970s, and Kawakubo is now considered one of the pioneers of fashion androgyny. He's even built into the name, as Comed de Garsohn began as a woman's wear company but had a name that translates from French to, like the boys. And then there's Kawakuba herself, who sports a bob cut with straight bangs almost identical to Igor's cut. We know for sure that Tyler is intimately familiar with Comte de Garcin. In his 2018 interview with Fantastic Man, the article's writer describes following around Tyler for a day while he searched for a rare

1988 book of the Comte de Garcin archive. Tyler also wore the brand for the cover of Grind magazine in 2018 when he was composing Igor. The brand's logo also includes an Astero. The brand's logo also includes an asterisk underneath Garson C, which might have had some influence on Tyler thinking the symbol look cool, as we see the asterisk views in a boy as a gun title, perhaps to symbolize the flashing bang of a gun or a bullet, and in its own French-inspired brand, Golf Lefleur, perhaps to symbolize a flower. It's not hard to see why Tyler would be drawn to Kawakubo's fluid genre-bending work. Perhaps the most interesting thread of comparison between the two can be found in referencing the Met exhibit titled Art of the In Between. To borrow from the

exhibit's description, Kawakubo's work expresses in-betweenness, or quote, occupies the spaces between dualities, which have come to be seen as natural rather than social or cultural, and how they resolve and dissolve binary logic. Defying easy classification themselves, her clothes exposed the artificiality, arbitrariness, and emptiness of conventional dichotomies, unquote. This in-betweenness was reflected in a series of exhibits with subtitles such as high, low, clothes, not clothes, male, female, self, other, and perhaps most relevant to Igor, beautiful and grotesque. When fused in an experience simultaneously, concepts that we previously thought to be dichotomous or separate expose the fallacy of a dichotomy even existing. A true spectrum would

not consist of a line between two points. Rather, it would be a three-dimensional experience of the points, their position, and all other space. In Igor, we've come to see similar concepts exposed. Igor is both beautiful and ugly, codependent and independent, feminine and masculine, loving and hating, sweet and vindictive, sometimes in the same breath. This is even apparent in this very verse on a boy as a gun. Understanding that the word garsohn is French for boy, Tyler's line, You're My Favorite Garcon, is endearing, which is an unexpected twist of emotion in an otherwise hostile verse. And this sudden sweetness continues as Tyler backtracks on brushing his crush off, saying,

don't leave, stay right here. Yeah, I want you right near. Tyler's all over the place, succinctly capturing the erratic emotional swings in the midst of a passionate fight, exhibiting the simultaneity of love and hate. Yeah, that song's like, fuck you, but no, no, no, don't leave. Don't leave.

But, fuck you, but, like, and I just wanted to rap, just, it's more I'm just talking. And it's very, a lot of the songs are very specific things, too. It's not just like it's take your hoodie off Why you hide your face for me Like I love that line I'm thinking of that I'm thinking of the moment Of that moment

Then I went home and wrote But it's a That one is a moment Lionel always said Yeah he said sound like a 1973 argument Where I'm just we're following each other In the house and like Yeah yeah yeah

The second verse comes to a close With another specific moment As Tyler wraps You invited me to breakfast Why the fuck your ex here It feels too specific to be anything other than the truth, and we can vividly picture this awkward trio at a diner table with Tyler stewing with anger. While we never actually hear from The Crush himself on the album,

this detail, the fact that he invited the girl to breakfast with Tyler, feels like a revealing moment. Perhaps the crush is totally oblivious to the way Tyler feels, which would be in line with Tyler's inability to communicate his feelings that we've tracked all season. For all we know, the crush has no idea the way Tyler feels about him, and thus thinks nothing of inviting the girl. There's also the possibility that the crush does know and is being intentionally resentful due to Tyler's ultimatum, pushing him into a situation or relationship he's not yet comfortable with. In any case, the breakfast triggers Tyler and he once again turns vindictive, saying, well, let's see if you're around a god around this time next year.

It's yet another boastful threat, with Tyler building himself up and comparing himself to a god as a defense mechanism against his bruised ego. Now, as a boy as a gun moves into his third and final hook, Tyler once again adds new. details to avoid monotony and build the song dynamically. The first thing we'll notice is that he brings back the repeating Don't Shoot Me Downs, which we haven't heard since the intro. This time with chaotic machine gun sound effects and this added synth part. As we just heard, Tyler once again changes the tail end of the hook, rapping,

That's why I start to think it's lame as fuck, before switching to singing to say, that I'm here for you. With this third change, we realized that Tyler encapsulates the arc of his relationship with his crush in the latter lines of each other. hook. It began because all these other N-words lame as fuck, we show him no respect, expressing the invincibility felt went together. It then progressed to, they show him no respect to express the conflict keeping them apart. And now the breaking point, that's why I'm starting to think it's lame as fuck that I'm here for you, expresses Tyler's frustration wasting his time on a person who's not as committed as he is. A boy is a gun then continues with a bridge, where the music bed becomes less reliant on the sample, and Tyler adds a number of original instruments.

In the first half of this bridge, amidst backing harmonies, Tyler introduces a rapidly arpaeated synth that takes over the chord progression. We also hear what sounds like an electric guitar. During this section, Tyler doesn't sing or rap. Rather, he talks straightforwardly to disclose the meaning behind his gun symbolism, saying, You're a gun, because I like you at my side at all times. You keep me safe. At this moment, the song sounds like it's going to return to the chorus or verse, but Tyler cuts it off saying, wait, wait. It's as if he didn't want to leave the gun definition as exclusively positive, as he then reveals,

depending on you know, you could be dangerous to me or anyone else. Tyler formally acknowledges the dichotomous symbolism of the gun as a weapon of self-protection and violence. This is not only felt in this moment in song, but also at a broader level when viewing the terror of new magic wand, which also centered around a gun, as a counterpart to a boy as a gun. Fittingly, in the direct middle point of the album, it's hard. Tyler exposes the duality of love and passion as both protective and destructive, that love has the ability to complete us and destroy us. It's not either or, it's a true simultaneity present at all times.

Now the tail end of this bridge contains a moment that Tyler himself made it a point to call out on Twitter, saying, quote, Solange's run at 241 is so warm on a boy as a gun. Sounds like an angel landing. Let's take another listen to this moment before heading into the song's final verse. Tyler being a fuck away the fuck away from me But stay the final verse rapping Look they'd be bringing us up yeah like now and again give a fuck what they talk about I see you as a 10

Once again there are outside forces working against this relationship with Tyler here defending his crush from what seems like criticism, as his point about him being a 10 is contrasted with outsiders judging them. Of all the lyrics on Igor, these might be the most self-referential in terms of Tyler acknowledging himself as a public figure with fans that have interest in his love life. Specifically, bringing us up now and again, seems to allude to fan theories regarding a man named Wyatt, a white male with rose-tinted cheeks who many have speculated to be the love interest on Tyler's previous album Flower Boy, an album that documented Tyler's personal journey with his sexuality and getting to a place he was finally comfortable telling a guy, possibly Wyatt,

that he had feelings for him. Thus, one can make a case that Igor picks up where flower boy leaves off, where Tyler, now comfortable with his sexuality, not only expresses his love to the guy, but pushes for the two to be together formally, publicly. These lines on the final verse of a boy as a gun contain the most over-evidence for the connection between the albums. It begins with, I see you as a 10, a line about Tyler's vision of this person, who he sees as perfect, despite the criticism he might get on message boards. Wyatt, by the way, received his fair share of criticism on Tyler's subreddit during the Flowerboy era. Now on Flower Boy song See You Again, Tyler sung,

20-20-Vision, Cupid hit me with precision. It's once again describing Tyler's perfect vision of his crush. 20-2020 visions. Cupid hit me, Cuban hit me with precision. I wonder if you look both ways and you cross my mind. While this specific link isn't convincing on its own, Tyler formally bonds See You Again in this verse when he says, I'm going to leave it at that, I'm going to leave us as friends, because the irony is, I don't want to see you again. The irony referred to here is that Tyler once wrote a song called See You Again for him, and now he feels the exact opposite.

Beyond this connection to see you again, the line I'm going to leave us as friends contained some references to Igor itself, specifically the line, I'm trying to be more than a friend from boyfriend, while also foreshadowing the finale track, Are We Still Friends? So the stated irony actually works on three levels. Tyler no longer wants to see this person he wrote See You Again for, he doesn't want to see the person he sees as a perfect 10, and he no longer wants to be more than friends despite stating the opposite back on boyfriend. And just in case the crush wasn't following Tyler's intricate wordplay, he spells it out as clearly as possible, repeating, stay the fuck away from me three times before saying, I ain't going to repeat myself,

but stay the fuck away from me. This final line feels like a perfect summation of a song in which Tyler waves unpredictably between love and hate, as even in his most overt, explicit, viciously worded attempt to break things off, he manages to contradict himself, saying he's not going to repeat himself just after and right before immediately repeating himself. And so while his intention might be to separate himself from his crush, we know it's very likely he won't be able to control himself. This self-contradiction embodies Tyler's Igor character, who seems to constantly go back on his word to remain with the guy, belying dependency and fear. Because despite the external toughness, the presentation of power, deep down, it's usually the loudest in the room or the one holding the gun that's the most afraid.

Conclusions With New Magic Wan and a Boy is a Gun being tracked six and seven on a 12-song album, we come to understand that Tyler has chosen the loaded metaphor of a gun. as Igor's central symbol, erected as it is here in the center of the album. As we noted earlier, a gun is a phallic symbol, an appropriate image to represent Tyler's male love interest, who stands in the center of this love triangle. The duality of the gun reflects how safe Tyler feels with his crush on his hip, and the emotional danger he poses if things don't work out. The underlying dynamic here is power.

Just as a gun has power to protect and destroy, so too does love. From the desperate and violent outlash of New Magic One to the seesaw of a boy as a gun. Tyler has been wrestling for power in this love triangle all album long, with a gun being emblematic of emotional severity, how love can often feel like life or death. But just as you can't totally control a gun, you can't totally control a person, a lesson Tyler is slowly coming to terms with. Beyond the album's narrative, the gun analogy, and specifically the title's gender alteration from a girl to a boy, feels in line with Igor's broader exhibition of the in-betweenness of gender and fluid sexuality, as well as its peripheral challenge of traditional masculinity,

the stereotypes and expectations placed on men's behavior and expression. In his own way, Tyler has been challenging these stereotypes and highlighting their dangers for years. Just listen to this conversation from 2021, when Tyler instantly cuts straight to the heart of homophobia and toxic masculinity, when asked why he satirically said pause, a slang word rooted in homophobic. I love Rocky. Talk to him a week ago. Y'all was in the studio together together for a while.

Just like... Yeah, we have so many random, like, ideas and rough drafts. I love working with him. He brings something out of me, pause that, like, I don't know. It's like... Why does it just... No, put something out of me to use a pause. See, pause.

But it brings something out of me just sounds where it could be night. Oh, could be jinnobes. What he brings out is jizz is what you're saying. Why do you have to go there? But why... Pauses are so ridiculous to do it. It is, but I say it to be ridiculous. Yeah, I say it to.

be ridiculous, so it's almost sad. But there are some things that are pauses. Like, especially New York, niggas be like, pause. Like, I tried to give someone a hug. And it was like, bro, we ain't on that. I'm like, it's so sad how deeply rooted this shit is. Like, you can't even show affection to someone that you care about because you think someone else is going to think that you're gay.

And that's why you probably shot that man last week because of that pent-up shit. It's deep shit. As Tyler articulates here, we are often so fragile, so uncomfortable in our own freedom that we react strongly. And as we felt in New Magic Wand, repression of any kind often leads to outlash, deadly outlash when guns are involved. We can see how this becomes a cocktail for self-destruction

in a society that has perpetuated, outdated traditions that fundamentally collide with how we or others might feel inside, be it traditional masculinity, femininity, heterosexuality, or any of the myriad expectations and limitations placed on things like gender or race. This kind of active barrier of expression prohibits evolution, prohibits evolution on an individual and societal level. An idea Tyler has also talked about

the ways in which we can become stuck when hanging on to a limited perspective or fearing the judgment of others. Having my first three albums and Cherrybaum in the middle and then the next three just that, it's really, I'm proud of that. I'm happy I allow myself to... Congratulations, man.

Thank you. Some people don't get that. Some people say stuck, stay stuck at the idea of themselves when they were 20 or when they were hot and they stay that way. and that's how you get old. He wasn't too cool to care. You can't be too cool because if you're too cool, you're going to freeze today.

Niggas is trying to be too cool and not be silly and always try to be hard and it's like, bro, you look dumb. As Tyler alludes to here, his own journey documented through his musical output, was made possible by allowing himself to evolve. From the shock-wrap teenager who ate a cockroach in his first major video to the flower boy who came out of the garden shed to sing love songs about boys. This is how he avoided, freezing to death, instead blossoming

into a cultural icon in the same vein as the icons he once looked to for protection. You realize now that you get to be that for other kids too, they get to see you and their parents like, what are you into, blah, blah, blah. They get to point to you and be like, no, no, P, caught me, like maybe seven months ago. It was like, you know

any photo you put on Instagram if your leg is weird or like you say something sassy or you know you a vessel for these kids. Just by doing that, it allows them to do their version. and I'm like, man, I don't want that responsibility, but I'm happy that someone could look at me as a safe, as a safe.

Just use that word in that broad sense as a safe, the same way I looked at him or I had Andre or I had Missy or I had Buster, I had Chappelle, I had Badoo, I had these gods who I get to talk to. I have Marshall, who I'm like, ah, even if they think this is weird at school, I could go back to that poster in my room. and Missy Elliott and word up

will be like, yeah, that shirt is that shit's important. It's really important. The beauty of Tyler's quote-unquote role model status is that he isn't trying to be one. Rather, he became one simply by existing freely, by expressing himself with honesty and without reservation, pursuing with great passion his own genuine interests,

the things he alone cares about. In this way, Tyler is the ultimate weapon, the most dangerous of guns. He's free. This episode of Dysect was written by Camden Ostrander and me. If you enjoyed today's episode, please tell a friend about the show or share on social media and tag at Dysect Podcast. It really helps.

Limited season 10 merchandise can be purchased at Dysectpodcast.com. Audio editing by Kevin Pooler, songw recreations by Andrew Atwood. Theme music by Birocratic. All right, thanks everyone. Talk to you next week.