Songoftheday 3/29/24 - Roll up like that stank and get it on, slank that fitted on came to get it on...

 

 

"Pump It Up" - Joe Budden

from the albums 2 Fast 2 Furious (Original Soundtrack) and Joe Budden (both 2003)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #38 (one week)

Weeks in the Top-40: 1

 

Today's song comes from rapper Joe Budden, who grew up in New York and New Jersey where he started his music career. Discovered by popular DJ Clue, Budden was signed by Def Jam Records, where he released his self-titled debut album in 2003. Mind you, it was quite rare for a rap artist to go by their given name, and also to have their first album as such as well, so it definitely took some self-awareness to carry that off. The first single from the record was the hype track "Focus", which featured labelmate and hip-hop royalty LL Cool J on the 12" single remix. The track climbed to #73 on Billboard magazine's R&B Singles chart.  

That was followed by the first "proper" single release "Pump It Up", written by Budden with producer Justin "Just Blake" Smith and using a sample of Kool & The Gang's "Soul Vibrations" giving them credit as well. That Kool sample was from their earlier heavy funk era, which colors Joe's song with a dark rhythmic backdrop for a party record. The verses have Budden describing the woman he wants, who is free and easy and not requiring much of him. It gets increasingly hard to listen as a wall of sound assaults the ears without much variation on the delivery. But it was at least away from the violence pervasive at the time, and with a FX-heavy music video and exposure from being on the soundtrack to the 2 Fast 2 Furious franchise movie, Joe found himself with his biggest success right off the bat...

"Pump It Up" scraped the top-40 on Billboard's Hot 100 in June of 2003, while peaking at #16 on their R&B Singles chart and #10 on the Rap Songs list. On the radio, the song rose to #14 on Billboard's Mainstream R&B chart and #18 on the dance/R&B-oriented Rhythmic format. Internationally, the single climbed to #13 on the British Singles Chart. The Joe Budden album, released in June as the single was cresting, came in at #8 on the Billboard 200 sales tally and #2 on the R&B Albums list. At the Grammy Awards in 2004, "Pump It Up" was nominated for Best Male Solo Rap Performance, losing to Eminem for "Lose Yourself". 

A final single from Joe Budden, "Fire" (Yes, Yes Y'all)", featured Busta Rhymes. It made it to #48 on Billboard's R&B Singles chart, missing the Hot 100 altogether. Later that year, Budden was featured on "Clubbin'" from former Immature singer Marques Houston, which will bring him to this series one more time.

 

Budden was preparing to put out a second album on Def Jam, but after two singles stiffed, with "Not Your Average Joe" with DJ Kaystay, Far Joe amd Joe (that's a lot of Joes) stopping at #63 on the R&B Singles chart, the release was cancelled and Joe booted from the label. Still, he popped on to the Hot 100 as a guest on Christina Milan's single "Whatever U Want", which took one week at the bottom rung, peaked at #91 on the R&B Singles list, and scored his sole appearance on the Mainstream Top-40 radio chart at #35.

The rapper had been also releasing "mixtapes" on his own, and his third one was transformed into a proper Mood Musik 3: The Album on the indie Amalgam label in the beginning of 2008, which took a solitary week at #88 on Billboard's R&B Albums chart. He followed that later that year with Halfway House, which made it to the Billboard 200 for a week at #184. A third try on Amalgam a year later, Padded Room, almost made the top-40 on the Billboard 200 at #42. Also in 2009, he joined forces with rappers Crooked I, Force da 5'9", and Joell Ortiz to form Slaughterhouse. Their first self-titled record went to #25 on the Billboard 200, and #4 on the R&B Albums list. Joe was especially busy that year, with another solo disc on Amalgam, Escape Route, came out that summer. 

 

A second Slaughterhouse album, Welcome To Our House, was put out in 2012 on Eminem's Shady label, and peaked at #2 on the Billboard 200 and spent a week at #1 on the R&B Albums list. A track from the record, "Throw That" featuring Eminem, popped on to the Hot 100 for a single week at #98.

In 2013, Joe switched over to E1 Music for his sixth proper studio album No Love Lost. Sporting cameos from a bevy of rap artists, the record placed him back into the top quarter of the Billboard 200 at #15, while spending a week at #1 on the R&B Albums list. The lead single from the set, "She Don't Put It Down" featuring rapper Lil Wayne and singer Tank, landed Budden back on the Hot 100 at #96, while reaching the top-40 on the R&B Singles chart at #32 and the Rap Songs list at #25. The song even hit the radio, slipping on to the Mainstream R&B chart at #27 and the Rhythmic list at #35. 

 

Since then, Budden has released two more studio albums, with his latest, Rage & The Machine, arriving on Mood Musik/eOne Records in 2016. The set topped the R&B Albums chart for a week, and peaked at #40 on the Billboard 200. He declared that he "retired" from music, delving into the world of the internet on a list of webseries as well as on the Love & Hip-Hop TV show. 

 

the 2 Fast 2 Furious soundtrack will be back to the series.

(3/10)

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Heres Budden performing "Pump It Up" on MTV in 2003...

Tomorrow I'll roll out my top hits of this week, then on Monday Song of the Day will be back with three hip-hop acts doing the limbo.