I think this is about someone who liked gangsta rap as a young person, and perhaps even found the rappers and thugs to be sexually attractive (based on the fact that most of them were male, and it is a female singing the song), but also wished to show them a better way of life, in the way that some people think they can change their romantic partners, or that their romantic partners will change.
I'm American (and closer to the Gulf Coast, I might add), so I'm basing this partly off the "west coast" line; I may be wrong, but gangsta rap originally featured L.A. groups and artists before it became a national-level thing. The band is Canadian, so there may be something specifically Canadian west coast referenced here that I wouldn't know about.
I think this is about someone who liked gangsta rap as a young person, and perhaps even found the rappers and thugs to be sexually attractive (based on the fact that most of them were male, and it is a female singing the song), but also wished to show them a better way of life, in the way that some people think they can change their romantic partners, or that their romantic partners will change.
I'm American (and closer to the Gulf Coast, I might add), so I'm basing this partly off the "west coast" line; I may be wrong, but gangsta rap originally featured L.A. groups and artists before it became a national-level thing. The band is Canadian, so there may be something specifically Canadian west coast referenced here that I wouldn't know about.