Songoftheday 11/8/19 - First things first I Poppa freaks all the honeys, dummies Playboy bunnies those wanting money...

"One More Chance (Stay With Me)"/"The What" - Notorious B.I.G.
from the album Ready To Die (1994)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #2 (three weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 17

Today's song(s) of the day comes from rapper Notorious B.I.G., whose debut album Ready To Die had already spun off two "double-sided" charting singles with "Juicy"/"Unbelievable" and "Big Poppa"/"Warning", the latter reaching the top ten in the spring of 1995. For the follow-up to that big hit, Biggie Smalls and producers Puff Daddy and Ringo Smith took an album cut from Ready To Die, "One More Chance", and overhauled it for the single release with new lyrics, production, and a chorus that interpolated the DeBarge quiet storm classic "Stay With Me" with his future wife Faith Evans and Mary J. Blige singing backup...

"One More Chance (Stay With Me)" became Biggie's second top ten pop hit in July of 1995. The song was his biggest success on the R&B chart in Billboard magazine, spending nine weeks at #1, and doing the same on their Rap Singles chart. Internationally, the single peaked at #7 in Canada, and reached the top-40 in the UK at #34.

The "B-Side" of the CD, cassette, and 12" vinyl singles of the track was Ready To Die album cut "The What", which got enough airplay to be listed on the chart with "One More Chance" for three of its 20 weeks. The cut featured Method Man from the Wu-Tang Clan...

There were no other singles released from Ready To Die. Instead, the track "Runnin' (From Tha Police)" came out, which was notable since it was a rare collaboration between Biggie and 2Pac (along with the group Dramacydal) originally for the latters' album Me Against The World. That didn't happen because of the igniting feud between the pair that would eventually lead to both their deaths. The song would be reworked by Eminem in 2003 into the top-20 pop hit "Runnin' (Dying To Live)".

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Here's the album version of "One More Chance", which has a different groove and production and featured the group Total on backup vocals...

Here's Biggie performing "One More Chance (Stay With Me)" at Showtime At The Apollo...

and again live at the Source Awards in 1995...

Here's Biggie and Method Man performing "The What" live in concert...

and finally at another awards show with Junior Mafia's "Get Money"...

Up tomorrow: Irish rock legends heed the Batsignal.