When NF introduced a collaboration with Machine Gun Kelly, the pairing appeared virtually prophetic.
Each artists have spent years excavating their private trauma by music, refusing to cover behind manufactured personas.
“WHO I WAS,” the third observe on NF’s FEAR EP launched November 14, 2025, stands as their first joint effort, a uncooked meditation on generational ache, anger administration, and the variations of ourselves we’ve outgrown.
The Sonic Structure
The observe opens with stripped-back acoustic guitar, instantly establishing an environment of naked honesty.
This minimalist method feels proper for the weighty themes each artists deal with. The manufacturing, dealt with by Aaron Chafin, NF, and Jeff Sojka, layers pitched-up vocal samples that hang-out the refrain, creating an virtually ghostly presence that represents previous selves watching from the shadows.
All through the music, distorted digital components punctuate the acoustic basis, representing the chaos each artists describe of their verses.
These sonic disruptions mirror the emotional turbulence within the lyrics, pulling listeners between moments of calm reflection and aggressive depth.
The manufacturing decisions replicate NF’s signature model whereas accommodating MGK’s genre-fluid method, leading to one thing that feels neither absolutely hip-hop nor completely various, simply devastatingly trustworthy.
mgk’s Confession Sales space
Machine Gun Kelly opens with a verse that reads like remedy notes set to rhythm. His supply comes rapid-fire, barely pausing for breath as he navigates by private trauma.
The Cleveland artist has by no means shied from vulnerability, however this verse finds him notably unguarded.
His opening imagery hits instantly, looking for a house he’s by no means identified with no deal with to information him.
The metaphor extends when he compares his scattered coronary heart to his father’s ashes by accident dropped in a rental automotive.
It’s an uncomfortable, visceral picture that captures each carelessness and grief. This isn’t sanitised ache; it’s the messy, difficult actuality of loss and remorse.
mgk threads spiritual imagery all through his verse, discussing his two-decade absence from religion and his eventual return.
The reference to being embraced “like I’m His Son” with out judgment carries explicit substance, particularly given his public struggles and controversial moments.
He’s looking for unconditional acceptance whereas acknowledging the archetypes he’s anticipated to fulfil.
The verse grows darker as mgk references shedding a finest good friend, crying at an open casket.
His point out of getting a finest man chosen for a marriage that by no means occurred, changed as a substitute by guilt he carried, possibly alludes to his relationship with Megan Fox and their damaged engagement.
The road “I left every part behind however this engagement ring and a frozen coronary heart” encapsulates the emotional harm he’s nonetheless processing.
NF’s Generational Nervousness
The place mgk sprints by his verse, NF takes a unique method, measured, virtually conversational at factors, earlier than constructing to determined admissions.
His part centres on a concern many dad and mom perceive: turning into the dysfunction you skilled as a baby.
The Michigan rapper appears at his personal youngsters and feels unhappiness, hoping they gained’t replicate his patterns.
“Hope they don’t wind up like Dad, caught on this loop like I’m” features as each confession and warning.
He recognises his anger points, his tendency to overreact, the push-pull dynamic the place he professes love then treats individuals poorly.
This self-awareness doesn’t equal self-forgiveness, although, NF appears trapped by data of his flaws with out figuring out the way to escape them.
His repeated line “wasn’t taught that in my home” acknowledges how trauma perpetuates throughout generations.
Emotional regulation, wholesome communication, applicable responses to emphasize, these aren’t innate expertise. They’re realized behaviours, and when your childhood residence didn’t mannequin them, you’re left fumbling in maturity.
The verse construction itself reinforces the cyclical nature of his wrestle. After describing his must “take a breath and relax,” he repeats the identical traces once more, actually making a loop within the music’s construction.
It’s a intelligent technical selection that embodies his feeling of being caught in repetitive patterns.
The Refrain as Shared Language
Each artists be a part of for the refrain, their voices mixing over the easy admission that every part they care about is “burning up.”
The fireplace imagery connects to NF’s broader FEAR challenge, the place his psychological mansion burns on the album cowl.
However right here, the flames symbolize one thing extra common, the destruction of former identities, relationships that couldn’t survive private development, and the painful technique of transformation.
The pitched-up vocal impact on sure phrases creates an eerie high quality, like listening to echoes of who these artists was once.
Nothing stays of their earlier selves, diminished to ash and dirt. There’s grief in that acknowledgment, even when these former variations brought on hurt.
Why This Collaboration Issues
NF hardly ever collaborates, making his decisions important when he does. His partnership with mgk alerts mutual respect between artists who’ve been dismissed, criticised, or pigeonholed all through their careers.
Each have confronted accusations of being too emotional, too darkish, too involved with their very own ache.
But their willingness to be susceptible has created devoted fanbases who see their very own struggles mirrored within the music.
The observe works as a result of neither artist tries to outperform the opposite. mgk doesn’t try and match NF’s rapid-fire supply in his personal verse; NF doesn’t shift to rock-influenced vocals to satisfy mgk’s latest aesthetic.
As an alternative, they every carry their genuine method, creating complementary views on comparable themes.
The Therapeutic Perform
“WHO I WAS” operates as public remedy, which has grow to be each artists’ signature method.
There’s one thing cathartic about listening to profitable musicians admit they’re nonetheless carrying harm, nonetheless battling anger, nonetheless afraid they’ll harm the individuals they love.
It normalises in search of assist and acknowledging ache relatively than performing invincibility.
The music doesn’t supply options or neat resolutions. Each artists stay works in progress, conscious of their points however nonetheless wrestling with them.
That trustworthy admission would possibly show extra helpful than false optimism. Progress isn’t linear, and development doesn’t imply you’ve conquered your demons, typically it simply means you’ve realized to recognise them.
Remaining Ideas
“WHO I WAS” succeeds as each a collaboration and a confession. The sparse manufacturing retains concentrate on the phrases, whereas the emotional performances from each artists create real connection.
This isn’t industrial calculation or strategic genre-blending, it’s two individuals who’ve weaponised their ache by music, discovering frequent floor of their shared willingness to look at their darkest corners publicly.
The observe will resonate most with listeners who’ve requested themselves comparable questions: Will I repeat my dad and mom’ errors? Can I break generational patterns? How do I categorical love when anger comes simpler?
These aren’t summary philosophical questions, they’re day by day struggles for anybody carrying childhood trauma into grownup relationships.
In making their ache public, NF and MGK create permission for others to acknowledge their very own.
That’s the facility of susceptible artwork, it transforms isolation into neighborhood, disgrace into shared expertise.
“WHO I WAS” gained’t repair anybody’s issues, nevertheless it would possibly make them really feel much less alone in dealing with them.
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