Songoftheday 5/30/23 - I know that you're lovin me 'cause you thug with me, who bust slugs for me?
"Down Ass Chick" - Ja Rule featuring Charli "Chuck" Baltimore
from the album Pain Is Love (2001)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #21 (two weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 9
Today's song comes from rapper Ja Rule, whose third album Pain Is Love had already spun off a top ten lead-off hit with "Livin' It Up", as well as a #1 pop crossover smash with "Always On Time". He also was featured on a couple high-profile singles with Mary J. Blige's "Rainy Dayz" and the album version of Fat Joe's "What's Luv". The third single from the album, "Down Ass Chick" (censored from "Down Ass Bitch" from the album), paired Rule with another rapper from Philadelphia, Charli Baltimore, instead of the R&B singers that were on the last two hits. Baltimore, born Tiffany Lane, was romantically involved with Christopher "Notorious B.I.G." Wallace. After his death, she released her own debut single, "Money", that was originally on the soundtrack to the movie Woo in 1998. The O'Jays-sampling track climbed to #59 on Billboard magazine's R&B chart, and placed at #70 on the all-genre Hot 100. That was followed a year later by "Stand Up" featuring rapper Ghostface Killah from the Wu-Tang Clain, which stopped at #84 on the R&B chart. The latter appeared on her debut and only regular studio album Cold As Ice, which came out in 1999 but failed to chart.
Dropped from her original label Untertainment, she was brought in to Ja Rule's Murder Inc. crew, and "Down Ass Chick" was her first big single as a feature. The track was written by Ja and Charli along with producers Irv Gotti and 7 Aurelius, who gave the record a notable guitar hook. For Ja Rule, it was a detour to his mainstream pop radio-friendly collabs, trying for the harder "I'm a criminal" tack, but with the usual Bonnie and Clyde narrative that many (including himself) had gone before. Rule throws in gun play like he hasn't since his first album, while Charli spits out such weird lines like "Who's your organ donor?". It's a product that fits a market that they were going for, and in that aspect, it was a success, but at the expense of mainstream radio love, which this was a little too gangster for. The music video casts the pair as home thieves, where one of them is caught and Ja Rule has his usual facial expression that can best be described as "having a stroke while taking a giant shit"...
"Down Ass Chick" became the third top-40 crossover pop hit on Billboard's Hot 100, stopping right under the top-20 in June of 2002, while making it to #8 on their R&B Singles chart and #5 on the Rap Singles list. On the radio, the song peaked at #9 on the dance-oriented Rhythmic format chart. Internationally, the single reached the top-40 in Australia at #37, while becoming a minor British hit at #91.
Another track from the album, "Never Again", wasn't released as a proper single, but got enough urban radio airplay to make it on to Billboard's R&B Singles chart at #68. (Frankly it was a better record.)
Ja Rule and Charli Baltimore will return to the series.
(4/10)
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Here's the pair appearing on Showtime At The Apollo in 2002...
and lastly, at the BET Awards...
Up tomorrow: Comic rap superstar is positive you miss them.
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