Songoftheday 7/11/21 - Can I hit in the morning without giving you half of my dough, and even worse if I was broke would you want me..
"Can I Get A..." - Jay-Z featuring Amil and Ja Rule
from the albums Rush Hour (Original Soundtrack) and Vol. 2...Hard Knock Life (both 1998)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #19 (two weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 23
Today's song of the day comes from rapper Shawn Carter, who goes by his stage name Jay-Z, who grew up in New York City and there is where he started his own record label Roc-A-Fella Records. Hooking up with indie distribution kings Priority, Jay-Z landed a top-40 album on his first try with Reasonable Doubt in 1995 (#23), going on to move over a million copies. The set had a previously featured "robbed hit" twofer in "Ain't No N**ga"/"Dead Presidents" in the summer of 1996. The following year, he guested on rapper Foxy Brown's single "I'll Be", which not only brought Jay-Z into the pop top-40, but into the top ten that spring. The rapper returned at the end of 1997 with his sophomore effort, In My Lifetime, Vol. 1, which landed in the top ten on the Billboard 200 sales tally at #3, and produced another modest pop success (and former "robbed hit") with the Glenn Frey-sampling "The City Is Mine" in the spring of 1998. But by then Carter was definitely making his mark on the hip-hop world, currently being dominated by the Sean "Puff Daddy" Combs Bad Boy factory.
That summer, Jay-Z would come back with a song that would appear on both his third album as well as the soundtrack to the Jackie Chan/Chris Tucker buddy movie Rush Hour, released weeks apart. "Can I Get A...", featuring then unknown rappers Ja Rule (Jeffrey Atkins) and Amil (Whitehead), set itself apart from the Combs clan by eschewing the obvious samples and instead bringing out an infectious bouncy beat brought in by producer Irv Gotti (Irving Lorenzo) that instantly makes one bob in place. The groove makes the medicine of the lyrics about questioning his woman's intentions regarding his wealth go down better, and Amil's female counterpart also helps out leveling it off, plainly stating that is he wasn't ambitious she would not be there. Ja Rule, pretty self-assured for a newcomer, counters Amil's verse with how his lovin' abilities are worth it in itself, and that he can love 'em and leave 'em just the same. In fact, the beat is so mesmerizing and the trio blend so well together that the "clean" edition put out for radio, which substitutes the "Fuck You"'s for "What What"s, works just as well. The song entered the R&B chart the same time as the lead offering from the Rush Hour movie, Dru Hill's "How Deep Is Your Love", taking advantage of Billboard magazine's chart rules that required a "retail single" release, putting the song out in 12" vinyl only. When the rules changed in December of 1998, the song had already gained traction on pop and urban radio thanks to the "What What" mix...
"Can I Get A..." became Jay-Z's first top-40 pop hit as a lead artist in January of 1999. The song also climbed to #6 on Billboard's R&B chart, his third top ten after his guest spots on "I'll Be" and Jermaine Dupri's "Money Ain't A Thang". Because its vinyl-only release, the song stopped down at #22 on the Rap Singles chart, but that's respectable for that format. Internationally, the single made the top-40 in Germany (#12), France (#23), the UK (#24), Switzerland (#26), the Netherlands (#30), and Canada (#36). The Vol. 2...Hard Knock Life album released in September of 1998, topped the Billboard 200 sales chart for five weeks, going on to sell over five million copies. At the Grammy Awards in 1999, the Hard Knock Life album won the trophy for Best Rap Album.
Amil would go on to feature on two more of Jay-Z's top-20 R&B hits; "Do It Again (Put Ya Hands Up)" which hit #17 in 2000 (#65 on the Hot 100), and also that year "Hey Papi" from the Nutty Professor II soundtrack which got to #16 (#76 on the hot 100). She released her own debut album on Roc-A-Fella, All Money Is Legal, in 2000 as well. Lead single "Da Fam", featuring Jay-Z along with Beanie Sigel and Memphis Bleek, only nicked the R&B chart for a week at #99, though. And while, the album rose to #45 on the Billboard 200 sales chart, and #12 on the R&B Albums tally, it apparently performed way under the amount of promotion behind it (hell, Beyonce was on it), and she was dropped from the label.
As for Ja Rule, who wrote the base for this record originally for his own project, he will eventually make it on this series as a lead artist. And Jay-Z will be here....again...tomorrow.
(9/10)
(Click below to see the rest of the post)
Up tomorrow: Today's rapper goes to Broadway.
Comments