From Eminem Adversary to Punk Rocker, Machine Gun Kelly’s Downfall Was His Rebirth
With new album Tickets to My Downfall, MGK attempts to change his reputation and improve his mental health.
Written by Beril Saygin
Photo courtesy of Interscope Records
Content warning: This story contains discussions of depression and suicide.
Known for his tattoo-covered torso, “cigarette-come-to-life” smoking hot looks, and inducing bi-panic with his partner, Megan Fox, 30-year-old rapper Colson Baker (aka Machine Gun Kelly) recently revamped his musical style and released his first punk album, Tickets to My Downfall. MGK has always been the ‘bad boy:’ heavily tatted, lover of anarchy, and public endorser of drug use. But with his recent album, he’s channeled his persona into punk rock, a transition from his previous rap genre.
A native Texan, MGK relocated frequently during his childhood, eventually attending high school in Cleveland, a city which he frequently references as the birthplace of his music career. His first studio album, Lace Up, released in 2012 received positive critical feedback. In 2017, he collaborated with Camila Cabello to release “Bad Things,” charting at No. 4 on Billboard’s Hot 100. The rapper’s third studio album, Bloom, gained him further recognition and developed his signature anarchic sound and lyrics. While it has catchy beats and a plethora of angry, explosive lyrics, the album is not particularly memorable. MGK’s youth and inexperience are evident, although his enthusiasm and love for his art are clear. His early albums seem to have sprung directly from the rough and tumble streets of Cleveland. He sounds like a teenager’s blacked-out V6 Mustang ripping down the street, full of angst and self-importance.
The rapper often incorporates his personal life into his music. He frequently references his friendship with SNL comedian Pete Davidson, whose voice is frequently featured in interludes like “kevin and barracuda” and “A Message From the Count.” His music also deals with tumultuous childhoods, mental health struggles, and his daughter. More notably, the rapper has also discussed his infamous, publicized feud with rapper Eminem. As two white rappers occupying a similar space in hip-hop due to their edgy (often controversial) lyrics, perhaps Eminem and MGK were bound to clash. Their public beef began in 2012, when the younger rapper inappropriately commented that Eminem’s 16-year-old daughter was “hot as f-ck” in a since-deleted tweet. The feud continued with several diss tracks released on both sides — namely, Eminem’s “Not Alike” and MGK’s “Rap Devil,” in which he called out his rival by referencing “Rap God:”
Mad about somethin’ I said in 2012
Took you six years and a surprise album just to come with a diss
Homie, we get it, we know that you're the greatest rapper alive
F-ckin’ dweeb, all you do is read the dictionary and stay inside
F-ck Rap God, I'm the Rap Devil
MGK released his fourth album, Hotel Diablo, at the culmination of his personal and professional struggles: depression, a suicide attempt (“I put my daughter to bed then attempted to kill myself in the kitchen,” the Eminem feud, and substance abuse. The album has the most grim and world-weary tone of any of his previous records, as the rapper channels his anger and sadness to offer a deeply personal and intimate look into the oftentimes dark mind of Colson Baker. The record deeply reveals the rapper’s struggles, which catalyzed the personal and musical transformation evident from Tickets to My Downfall. The record also features collaborations with notable pop punk musicians Travis Barker and Yungblud, which seemed to foreshadow his genre switch in the Barker-produced Tickets to My Downfall. Speaking with Interview Magazine about his decision to make changes to his life in 2020, the rapper revealed:
“Hotel Diablo … was the first time I really expressed my true self with no outside influence, meaning the label. As a hip-hop album, it’s flawless front to back, and also a hint at the evolution of how I went into a pop-punk album. But it was coming off the tail-end of that infamous beef [with Eminem]. So no one wanted to give it the time of day.”
In the same interview, MGK credited his friend, collaborator, and Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker, as well as his partner, Megan Fox, with inspiring him to improve his life. He spoke candidly about seeking therapy to face his childhood traumas, current mental health struggles, and substance abuse: “Currently, my drug of choice is happiness and commitment to the art, rather than commitment to a vice that I believed made the art.”
Photo courtesy of Kevin Amata
In the featured single, “Bloody Valentine,” the rapper sings about his desire to “play pretend / And treat this night like it’ll happen again” with Megan Fox. As opposed to rapping angrily about drugs and violence, “Bloody Valentine” is about his passion for his relationship which has given him a reason to look forward to the future. Similarly, in “Concert for Aliens,” MGK acknowledges past struggles and mentions some of his difficult youth: “I heard you never graduated from high school / (…) I know you wanted me to go to law school / I dyed my hair, pierced my nostril.” But, difficulties aside, the song is about moving beyond the turbulence to “get my life back later.”
In addition to signaling the beginning of a more positive mental headspace for the rapper, Tickets to My Downfall marks the end of his rap career and the beginning of his punk rocker status. For the album, he finally shed his typical melancholic spitfire in favor of a much lighter, optimistic tone, with the benefit of having seasoned punk rocker Travis Barker in his corner. As a soft punk record, Tickets to My Downfall cannot rival the sheer anger and energy of emo icons like My Chemical Romance or Blink-182, but it can hold its own as an MGK pop-punk experiment and reinvention. The sound is unpolished: The pacing and bpm of most of the tracks feel very similar, and his instrumentals can sound generic. At times, the album can feel more like a tribute to the 2000s classics like Fall Out Boy, Green Day, Paramore, and Good Charlotte, as MGK adopts the signature emo accent in “Bloody Valentine.”
Not only is Tickets to My Downfall MGK’s tribute to his punk icons, it is a tribute to his partner and his life-changing year in 2020. In an interview with NME, he explained that, “Tickets is essentially my diary, because I did fall in love during the making of this record, and I did become a better person.” While 2020 could have easily been the rapper’s personal and professional downfall, he mused, “I think the universe caught on to me wanting to make a change. It was like: ‘Maybe we won’t make this a reality; maybe we’ll make this ironic.’ Instead of the downfall, go ahead and have the biggest rise of your f-cking life.”
Punk rock is a genre that rejects the mainstream and extends its arms to the losers and the misfits. He already has the look and the attitude down, so with some more practice, MGK may be able to add some more originality to his tribute of the genre and create his own unique sound. Tickets to my Downfall is nothing that fans of the punk rock genre haven’t seen before, but for MGK fans and the rapper himself, it is revolutionary. It marks the end of a turbulent period of time in the rapper’s life, as his newfound romance and genre of music have reignited an optimistic outlook and passion for his art.