Gucci Mane's Cover Story Interview for XXL Magazine Fall 2016 Issue

Guuci Mane has been the topic of everybody conversation, about his release from jail, him having a clone, changing his swagg, and now his XXL exclusive Cover Oct 18. XXL sits down with Gucci and ask all the questions the fans wanna know, as he open up about his struggle with drugs, Young Thug, his new look at life and much more. Here's some questions with Gucci below.... On His Toxic Past “During that time, I was just toxic. I really was just high as hell, out my mind. And I don’t blame…I’m not using the drugs as an escape. It was me. I was in a bad place and I was just so high that I felt like in my mind at the time, like, maybe the only way I could feel good, maybe if I hurt somebody else. I was just that frustrated and that stressed out. I had like six open cases, so it was like, could nobody do right. Everybody was wrong. You know what I’m saying? Even if you was trying to help me, you ain’t do it quick enough. Your timing was off. You really don’t care. You were being manipulative or you just doing it to get something outta me. I just seen things through a clouded lens, so the whole Twitter rant was an example of a person just self-destructing.” On Quitting Drugs “If you would’ve told me before I went to jail that I could stop drinking lean and smoking weed…I knew people could do that and I had heard stories of that, but I never wanted to do that. I never ever wanted to not be high. I enjoyed doing it so much so…but I was thinking about putting my plan together, after, like, a year of being away from drugs, it became part of my plan. The way I’m handling business now and the way I think now is way more sharper than how I was before. Maybe if I don’t do that, that’ll keep me from keep going back and forth to jail. I just kept building on that and making that a part of my life. Once I embraced that, it just made me treat everything different. And I think that’s why I’m getting better results now ’cause my whole approach is just different.” On His Protégé, Young Thug “I always used to tell Thug, ‘You signed to me, but at the end of the day, you the boss of Young Thug Entertainment. You Young Thug Records like I’m Gucci Records. I gotta manage me. If somebody tell me to be somewhere, I gotta make sure I’m there. Can’t nobody make sure I’m there but me.’ I used to always preach that to them. Don’t think just because somebody may be the financier right now, things change. You might be on a way bigger level than me or whoever behind you, but you got to handle yourself like you a business, like you a brand, so that everybody that meet you be like, ‘I want to do business with this guy. He talented, but at the same time, he understand what’s going on.’” On the New Atlanta Hip-Hop Scene “There’s a different sound to some of the stuff that’s going on. I’m forcing myself to like it because, it’s different. It’s not what I grew up listening to. It’s not the stuff I would generally play in my car, but if everybody else like it, who am I to say they’re stupid or that they’re wrong? …Yeah, so that’s kinda how it ended up, like if I keep saying that it’s stupid, then that means the next four, five artists that’s hot, I don’t sign them. I don’t got no part in what they got going on because I alienate myself. So, I’m forcing myself to see what’s going on now. I be like, They’re creative. They’re smart. They’re marketing themselves. They some little geniuses. That’s how I’m thinking now, so when I see them, “Hey, I like what you got going on” and I’m not being fake about it even if I’m not the biggest fan of their music or whatever.”