Old School Friday: Ice Cube "Check Yo Self"

This week’s Old School theme is old school hip-hop. In my previous post (more like rant) I used the Ice Cube song “Cave Bitch” to express my sentiments. So I decided to stick with my man Cube for my pick this week and select “Check Yo Self”. This is when Ice Cube was at his peak! The song featured Das Efx who had every rapper putting “iggity” in their lyrics. The video continues where “It Was a Good Day” left off. With the work drama I faced this week, some rhymes by O’Shea Jackson definitely fits the bill.

Check out other Old School Friday participants here.

Have you seen this rapper? Ice Cube

Watching a trailer for “First Sunday”, a few weeks ago, it dawned on me how much I miss Ice Cube, Ice Cube the rapper. I miss the “Amerikka’s Most Wanted”, “Kill at Will”, “Lethal Injection” Ice Cube. When Bomb Squad was producing his albums and when he was scaring White folks (and some black folks). When he was “The Nigga You Love to Hate”. Cube wasn’t your typical gangsta rapper. It wasn’t all guns, drugs, and girls in his songs. Although there were elements of that, Cube was more of a storyteller to me and many of his songs addressed the social issues facing the inner city, in particular South Central Los Angeles. One of his biggest hits “It Was a Good Day” described what an ideal day would be for young black man growing up in the ghetto. However, the song doesn’t become all sappy and sunny. At the end of the song Cube stops the beat and says “Hey wait, wait a minute fool/Stop the shit/What the fuck am I thinking about?”. Cube the realist or the cynic comes back.
I don’t know how I feel about Ice Cube the ‘actor’. He’s done good work in the past with “Boyz n tha Hood”, “Friday”, and “Barbershop”. But his most recent movies (especially First Sunday, which I will only see as a bootleg), had me longing for the old Ice Cube.

So in honor of the artist formerly know as “The Nigga You Love to Hate”, here are two of his videos that are my favorites:

True to tha Game — I loved this video, this was when rappers considered crossing over to the pop charts a mortal sin. Even though many of them were getting mad play on MTV and going platinum. I love how DJ Pooh plays a MC Hammer look-a-like. I wonder if the movie “Drop Squad” with Eriq LaSalle (remember that one) was based on this video or if the video was based on the movie? I can’t remember.

Steady Mobbin — Favorite quote “Went to mom’s house and dropped a load in the bathroom/Jumped back in my low rider/Comin out feelin about ten pounds lighter.”