Lil Wayne’s rock efforts have paid off: His Rebirth album has been certified gold, moving more than 500,000 copies, according to the Recording Industry of America.

The announcement, courtesy of his label, comes one week and one day after the rapper turned himself to begin a one-year jail sentence for a 2007 gun charge in New York.

On Rebirth, the New Orleans rapper eschewed turntables in favor of guitars as he produced a rock-concentrated project, which he called a “freedom album.”

“Yes, the album is still rock,” he told Billboard in October. “I play guitar on 80 percent of the songs, and there’s a lot of rock influences and rock beats. I also have Travis Barker on the album. But I don’t want people to think I’m trying to do something I can’t do.

When people hear me say rock, they may get a little scared, like, ‘Oh, God. What is he going to do?’ When I said I was doing a rock album, it was about doing a freedom thing. This album isn’t hip-hop. When I do my Carter albums, I know I’ve got to rap, I know I’ve got to spit.

Though Lil Wayne still raps plenty on the album, including on the Eminem featured “Drop the World.” (MTV)