Songoftheday 1/31/24 - I just wanna chill and twist a lot catch suns in my 7.45, you drive me crazy shorty I need to see and feel you next to me...
"21 Questions" - 50 Cent featuring Nate Dogg
from the album Get Rich or Die Tryin' (2003)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #1 (four weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 20
Today's song comes from Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson, who had a one-two punch in the spring of 2003 with his first two singles "Wanksta" from the Eminem movie 8 Mile and "In Da Club", with the latter topping the Billboard magazine Hot 100 for nine weeks. (Another track from the album, "Patiently Waiting" with Eminem, got enough unpromoted airplay on urban radio stations to place on Billboard's R&B Songs chart for 20 weeks with a high of #56.) The rapper wasted no time in following that huge hit with "21 Questions", which features the chorus sung by G-Funk veteran Nate Dogg, whose last time on the series as a lead was back in the summer of 1998 when he teamed up with Warren G for the single "Nobody Does It Better" from Nate's G-Funk Classics Vol 1 & 2. He did have a couple of high-profile feature slots on hits from Ludacris ("Area Codes") and Fabolous ("Can't Deny It") both in the autumn of 2001. The title of the new song refers to the series of queries Jackson is asking his woman, mostly to do with if she'd stay with him if he wasn't a money-making rapper (I always get a chuckle with the rappers who record this type of brag before even their first record comes out). The conversational flow of the verses doesn't really get as rote as I thought they'd be, and Nate Dogg's almost rap-singing style works well with it. The production from Kevin "Dirty Swift" Risto uses a sample of Barry White's minor R&B hit "It's Only Love Doing It's Thing" from 1978, giving Jimmie and Velta Cameron a writing credit on here as well as Risto and Jackson. Taking the plucked guitar from the intro to that nugget with not much else let's you concentrate on the words, to its advantage. The music video had 50 Cent and actress Meagan Good from Eve's Bayou play a Bonnie-and-Clyde-style couple getting caught by the police, where for kicks only 50 goes to jail, tormented by a hilariously too-cute-to-be-an-inmate model Tyson Beckford. The twist at the end I guess explains it..
"21 Questions" quickly followed "In Da Club" to the top of Billboard's Hot 100 in May of 2003 (with only three weeks of Sean Paul's "Get Busy" between them), while also topping the R&B Songs chart as well as the Rap Singles list for seven weeks. On the radio, the song peaked at #6 on the Mainstream Top-40 chart, took six weeks at #1 on the Mainstream R&B airplay list, and topped the dance/R&B-oriented Rhythmic format for four weeks. Internationally, the single reached the top ten in Australia (#4), Canada (#5 Sales), the United Kingdom (#6), The Netherlands (#7), and New Zealand (#8), It also made the top-40 in Ireland (#11), Switzerland (#14), Norway (#15), Hungary (#15), Denmark (#18), Finland (#20), Sweden (#34), Germany (#35), Belgium (#36 Wallonia/#37 Flanders), and Austria (#39).
Both 50 Cent and Nate Dogg as well as the album will be back to the series.
(6/10)
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Concurrently with 50 Cent's success with the song, female singer Lil' Mo released an "answer record" to it called "21 Answers", which made it to #50 on Billboard's R&B Songs chart...
Here's 50 and Nate performing the song live...
In 2020, Latin rapper Myke Towers remade the sample into his own single "Girl", which rose to #23 on Billboard's Hot Latin Songs chart...
And lastly, back to 50 Cent on tour behind the album in Europe in 2003...
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