Songoftheday 1/30/22 - What's your name cause I'm impressed, can you treat me good I won't settle for less...
"Hot Boyz" - Missy Elliott featuring Lil' Mo, Nas, Eve, and Q-Tip
from the album Da Real World (1999)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #5 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 21
Today's song comes from Missy Elliott, who had scored her first big hit in the fall of 1997 with the double-sided hit "Sock It 2 Me" and "The Rain (Supa Fly)". Two years later, Missy returned with her sophomore effort Da Real World. A more aggressively-styled album with a myriad of guest rappers, the first single from the set was "She's A Bitch", a collaboration with producer Tim "Timbaland" Mosley. Despite the high-tech flashy music video, the crass title alone got radio stations running away, and it stalled down at #30 on Billboard magazine's R&B Singles chart while only getting to #90 on the pop Hot 100. Her follow-up, "All In My Grill", featured rapper Big Boi from the Atlanta duo Outkast, and singer Nicole Wray. It had Missy singing through all of the track instead of throwing verses, and while it did better, going to #18 on the R&B Singles chart, it stopped at #64 on the pop Hot 100.
For Elliott's third try, she remixed the album track "Hot Boyz" to include not one but three guest rappers. Cynthia Loving, aka "Lil' Mo", sang the chorus on both versions, with Missy trading verses with Nas, Eve, and Q-Tip, all of whom had scored their own top-40 pop successes recently. With Timbaland again producing, Missy does an update on MC Lyte's "Ruffneck", describing the "hard" type of guy she wants and demands, with some brand-name car porn in the chorus. Eve backs her up, while Nas goes first, and off on his own tangent, while Q-Tip defends his toughness. The music video has a bunch of cameos like Mary J. Blige, but apparently Q-Tip couldn't make it so his verse is lost to Missy's original...
"Hot Boyz" became Missy Elliott's first top ten pop hit as a lead artist (along with the first for Lil' Mo, Nas, Eve, and Q-Tip) in January of 2000. The song topped Billboard's R&B Singles chart for six weeks, while spending a then-record-breaking 18 weeks on top of their Rap Singles list. Internationally, the single was a top-40 hit in the UK (#18) and New Zealand (#34). The Da Real World album, released in June of 1999, peaked at #10 on the Billboard 200 sales tally, as well as topping the R&B Albums list for a week, going on to sell over a million copies. At the Grammy Awards in 2000, Missy earned her second nomination for Best Rap Album, which went to Eminem for his Slim Shady LP. Missy, Lil' Mo, Nas,and Eve will return to the series as lead artists.
(5/10)
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Here's the true single remix version including Q-Tip's verse...
Next up, a snippet of Elliott, Lil Mo, and Eve doing "Hot Boyz" at a TV appearance...
And lastly, Missy with Lil Mo, Nicole, and Gina Thompson in Germany...
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