ATLANTA — While it might seem so at first glance, it's actually not all that unusual for hip-hop and NASCAR to intersect -- though the particular NASCAR figure making waves for his hip-hop fandom this week probably would have been hard to guess.
Mark Martin, the 65-year-old NASCAR Hall of Famer, is evidently a superfan of the Atlanta rap legend. He detailed his admiration for Gucci Mane in an interview with the Barstool show Rubbin' Is Racing and his specific clips talking about the rapper have gone viral over the past couple days.
"I'm gonna tell you right now, in my opinion there is no one in the same zip code as Gucci Mane," Martin told Rubbin' Is Racing.
Martin, who was named to a 1998 list of NASCAR's 50 greatest drivers and last year was included in an updated version of NASCAR's 75 greatest drivers of all time, explained how a son's friend helped him get into Gucci Mane back in the early-mid 2000s.
(Martin begins talking about Gucci Mane in the video below at 1:06:40)
In particular his explanation of using DatPiff, a mix tape distribution platform that was particularly influential in the late mid-late 2000s and early 2010s, resonated with hip-hop fans.
"I had one of my son's friends, you know they were kids, ask me did I listen to Gucci Mane. I didn't know who it was, so, as soon as I found him it was like crazy -- but you couldn't get him, hardly anything, on iTunes, you had to go to datpiff.com," Martin said. "And it was free, all the music was free, but you had to figure out how to download it onto your computer and then put it over to your phone."
Martin added that he preferred Gucci's older catalogue, when he was "a scary dude."
"I don't know what it is, I like that, you know, arrogance, that they carry," he said. "Because that's kind of, I hope, that's the opposite of me. I try to be, always wanted to be humble and not arrogant. But I like music that is arrogant."
Asked if he liked any newer hip-hop artists, Martin responded that he had liked the late Young Dolph and some of Gucci's apprentices, but that: "Honestly -- it's over, ain't nobody ever gonna be as good as Gucci."
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