Category: Music

I’m kind of obsessed with this tune. VERY late to the Hova party.

Can’t seem to find anything else of his that I like, so I’m going to have to put my enjoyment of this tune down to Rick Rubin’s production. Can always count on Rick.

Find the whole idea that rappers don’t do cover songs fascinating.  I don’t know if it’s due more to the fact that a rappers personality is so integral to their work or because of its early dependence on samples, which could be considered covers of a sort.

So is this song a cover? The title and chorus are from an Ice-T song. All the verses are original lyrics. So what do we call this?

I wonder how many Hova fans know the original tune. It’s a ridiculously catchy tune, with comically offensive sexist lyrics.  In other words, it’s an Ice-T song. I’ve always had a hard to defend affection for the Ice. I hate his sexism, but the man can rhyme. Even by rap standards he’s a bit of a caricature, but I admired his stances on censorship early in his career.

Oddly, the little reading I did on Jay-Z’s version indicated that his version isn’t sexist; that the “bitch” refers to a police dog that has been summoned to sniff out his coke (we’ll get back to that). Sorry, but I’m calling bullshit.

Still, the most interesting thing about this tune must be the unique ability of criminals to best express the unfair targeting of young black men by police officers while simultaneously proudly boasting of committing crime. I don’t understand why this doesn’t strike them as a bit preposterous. As if their illegal acts don’t cast a pall on their claims of racism.

In 99 Problems, Jay is unfairly harassed by a police officer because he’s a young black man. In point of fact, he is also trafficking cocaine, a crime for which he escapes detection because he refuses to allow the officer to search the car, and because he is lucky enough that a drug-sniffing dog cannot be quickly summoned. As the story goes, the officer eventually lets him go, and as Jay drives away he sees the car with the dog pull up. I think O Henry wrote a story like this…

Perhaps the funniest thing about 99 Problems is how inaccurately it is named. As fascinating as Jay’s story is, I must point out that it describes only 1 problem. Oh, the first verse is about critics and radio and rap mags, and the third goes on a bit more about paparazzi, but those are really sort of the same problem. Actually the whole third verse is sort of confusing. He makes some unclear comments about those infamous hoes; or is he talking about dudes who don’t fight? Or press or cops? It’s all pretty unclear, as he commits the most common songwriting crime: sacrificing clarity, definite articles and complete thoughts to the necessity of rhyming. But let’s be fair – we’ll round up, call it 10 problems. Makes you wonder why he bothered to crib the title from Ice.

Ice-T fares even worse; he really just spends the whole song counting how many bitches he has. In fact, he barely mentions having any problems at all. Problem #1 is getting money and it doesn’t even rear its head until the third verse. And for that matter, it isn’t even his problem – it comes via his guest Brother Marquis. Ice only appears to have 3 problems and he doesn’t get to them until the song is starting to fade out. By contrast, he rattles off descriptions of approximately 60 bitches & hoes, by my count. I’m not even linking to his tune because I don’t want you to hear it.

Of course, I’m quite sure that both Jay-Z & Ice-T have 99 problems. (Although I’m equally sure that my assessment of their problems wouldn’t mirror theirs; things I consider character flaws they are actually proud of.) It’s just odd that neither felt like listing them. Must be harder than it sounds…

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BTW, check out artist Ali Graham’s blog, where she illustrates a new problem for Jay-Z each day: http://probs99.tumblr.com/