It Remains The Same – Ice Cube’s “Gangsta Rap Made Me Do It” Video
GENERAL By Beware on January 4, 2008 at 9:16 amEven though Ice Cube’s last album, Laugh Now, Cry Later, was hailed by most for its resurgence in the street politician of old, for the most part, his core audience stopped paying attention once Are We There Yet? crashed Cineplex’s across the country in ‘05.
The domineering thought in the back of everyone’s minds seemed to be that, while Cube’s main forte will always be music, it’s just not where his heart was anymore. Actually, maybe it wasn’t even his heart as much it was that he was out of touch with his roots. As a grown man with children and companies to his credit, the man once hailed as Amerikkka’s Most Wanted had seemingly grown out of his old creased khaki suit.
As 2007 approached the rearview, however, O’ Shea Jackson debuted his new single, aptly titled “Gangsta Rap Made Me Do It.”
Immediately, everyone who’d seemingly lost faith in the South Central legend’s pen was vindicated by this rehabilitated fervor of the Cube of old. Over Maestro’s best Dr. Dre impersonation, the Don Mega speaks on how everything wrong he, or anyone else, has learned over the years through society can easily be blamed on the subgenre of hip-hop he helped create. Obvious contradictions, as rappers like him are only speaking on those ills themselves.
Now, since the single has garnered enough e-buzz to generate a coinciding video, Cube has found the perfect means to compliment his scathing words with the right visuals.
Digging deep into his old bag of tricks, and the CNN video vaults, the former front man of the Westside Connection calls outs everyone who uses gangsta rap as a scapegoat though some choice news clips from the past ten years or so. Without specifically calling out names, he picks apart Don Imus, polygamists and Dick Cheney, among others, by layering each of their own mishaps from over the years as the backdrop to his complimentary words. In one instance, he uses clips of Michael Richards’ racially-slurred break-down last year to enhance his own thoughts on the word that causes more tension than it does good. “I can say what I wanna say, ain’t nothin’ to it, gangsta rap made me do it/ If I call you a aggin, ain’t nothing to it, gangsta made me do it.”
“Gangsta Rap…” will be featured on Ice Cube’s next album, Raw Footage. If it’s any indication of the rest of the disc, the fact Cube brought out the Dough Boy look for this video wasn’t just a coincidence.
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36 Comments
emo made me do it
country made ME do it
haha. Yall funny. Christian Rock made me do it.
But seriously, is Will Smith and Ice Cube exact opposites: one raps hard, but makes soft movies, while the other raps soft and makes hard movies. What a business.
Hannah Montana made me do it…
Sheeeit. Folk music made ME do it.
these Beware articles read like Kent Brockman pengame
wtf is “hailed as” mean. it comes up a couple times early. so do alot of other cliches of this kind of storyline
the formula is always the same:
*try to “keep it real” for the heads but also pick verses apart like a hamburger paragraph in freshman comp class and at the same time think u have to sound like Dan Rather or Bob Ley “outside the lines”
*build artist up, break artist down, build artist back up again= artist X was hot, artist X fell off/wasnt hungry anymore, artist X came back because i say so and here are my reasons
*change up among artist’s alias’ throughout article to establish street cred
*overstate and exaggerate premises to create a higher dramatic mood
i guess GOTTY cant write every damn article in this piece. i just get tired of the corny shit and gotta spit my two coppers now and then…
dilla anthology 5?????
lol @ HCIC
I’m actually the least active “writer” out of the Crew.
As much as you’d expect me to go on the defensive of Beware, I understand your comments, even if they’re a bit harsh and perhaps you’re reading too hard IMO.
But it’s very much easier to sit back and criticize than it is to actually be the one to step up and do.
Therefore, holler @ me if you want to contribute by editing, putting your pen into action to help the cause or you have something to say.
We’re always taking in writers. Always.
“But seriously, is Will Smith and Ice Cube exact opposites: one raps hard, but makes soft movies, while the other raps soft and makes hard movies. What a business.”
Haha i know, it’s stranger than DJ Kahled saying Nigga
And a GWS wish to Nate dogg, i’ve been behind on my hip-hop news tip but thats some serious ish and i wish him and that ever magical voice a quick recovery
http://www.mediafire.com/?1tboj7ytmve
Killer Mike – Ghetto Extraordinary (Unreleased Material)
Another dope video:
AZ ‘The Hardest’ Featuring Styles P
Produced By Large Professor
http://videos.onsmash.com/v/4jylXUGElxGgycqg&res=800
Check the homies at graffitiresearchlab.com to peep the technology behind this video… some crazy thugged-out nerd shit!
^Oh & thats http://www.graffitiresearchlab.com
…..blind sweeping statements…. TC says fuck em’…..
Smoking Sections made me do it.
Cube’s Lethal Injection was my first rap tape, lets just say it put me in the mood most of the time. Im still a cube fan, shit he gotta make money somehow and if a kids movie does it then do it.
NEW DAVE GHETTO & WAAJEED (PLATINUM PIED PIPERS):
http://www.myspace.com/counterflowrecordings
Ice Cube makes family movies; Merilyn Manson is a guidance counselor; Madonna writes childrens’ books; Potential Black president wins first step to actually become president; Greumsy writes for TSS.
When I see pigs fly, I will have seen it all…
*Looks out window and sees police helicopter*
DDD – Yup.
Chris – Props sir.
TC – Some truth, a lot of fiction. Water off a duck’s back.
Will Smith and Ice Cube exact opposites: one raps hard, but makes soft movies, while the other raps soft and makes hard movies.
^^^
that’s pure greatness.
lol.
icecube used to do hard movies…used to.
just watched this video.
incredible.
Has anbody seen Greums since the New Year?
It’s weird but I sorta miss the fucker…
@ HCIC
If You don’t know what “hailed as” maybe that’s more a matter of your lack of a vocabulary than Beware being a poor writer. Read a book.
^^ i think that deciphering greums’s nonsensical logic was like playing sudoku for me – brain exercises.
now i have nothing else to rattle my senses.
lets hope Greums finally got some pussy so he doesn’t have to post 80 times a day!
And if i listen to good music
Ain’t nothing to it, TSS made me do it
i just love that song
About Greums, i think he ODed on that 2k7 compilation :p
NEW WAAJEED & DAVE GHETTO FOR ‘08!!! YES!!! This is great news, can’t wait for that shit to drop. Whatever happened to that chick Waajeed was working with, I believe her name was “Invincible”? She could spit some bars!
When I see pigs fly, I will have seen it all…
*Looks out window and sees police helicopter*
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LOL
DS, you DO know that I’m using this line all day at work, right? Hilarious.
@ Beware: Even though I may not agree with everything that you write, I’d rather read your shit than the crap I’ve read in the magazines and these other so-called hiphop websites. At least you know your hiphop, keep writing, fuck ‘em lames.
TSS staff, I look at it like this…
Y’all must be doing something right, b/c the arbitrary expectations for consistent “goodness” seem to be constant lately…
Keep up the good work.
^True Dat.
07 was one heck ov a yur.
I got to speak to Forrest Whitaker & Matthew Broderick.
Watched Denzel direct a movie.
Saw Rock The Bells, with Rebel Ins 5ft away from me as I recited along with him the lyrics to Triumph.
Sanaa Lathun watching me walk back & forth in front of camera.
08 looks to be just as good since in a week or 2 I’ll get to see Ice Cube put it down in his new movie!
Me & my homey performed on Jewella St. in Ratchet City last September.
Trust me I have a pretty boring life so anything I do thats dope is getting reported.
Hate it or love it…as long as they’re talking, it’s all motion baby.
TSS DEFINITELY made me do it.
Gotty, put out an APB on Greums. For all we know, he might be blacked on his keyboard in his little pièce in some random apartment in Northern France.
Or maybe he got locked up after vandalizing the Eiffel Tower with TSS tags.
Free Greums is the movement, aint nothin to it.
French Rap made him do it.
blacked out****
Greums is definitely not a he. Its an it.
Aw. He just needs a better editor. If there is one. “Domineering” should be “dominating”; “back of tricks” should be “bag of tricks”; and the grammar could be cleaned up, along with some of the more overwrought cliches. But that doesn’t mean he’s a bad writer. Just needs a little guidance on conventions and tone.
LMFAO @ my “best dre impersonation” sorry, gangsta rap made ME do it, lol