I def think you have to make a distinction between "the people who you knew" and "the people I went to high school with."
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:21 (thirteen years ago) link
Like I only can't conceive of any high school where everyone listens to the same shit
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:22 (thirteen years ago) link
While he was alive, I definitely knew "get money" & "crush on you" .. and throughout 97 pretty much all of the singles from both Life After Death and Victory were super ubiquitous.. I didn't know of "juicy" until around 2000 (due to college parties, funkmaster flex, etc etc).. so I got the impression that its legacy as his signature song grew the most throughout the 00s.
― billstevejim, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:24 (thirteen years ago) link
In my sophomore English class in '90, a total dork carried a pencil case for his art class on which he'd written "Beastie Boys rule!" I thought, "lol who cares about the Beastie Boys in 1989?" Paul's Boutique was a non-event then.
― Gucci Mane hermeneuticist (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:27 (thirteen years ago) link
^^^ that's a massive truthbomb
― and by "Heavens!" i mean WATERFALLS OF BIDDY (HI DERE), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:30 (thirteen years ago) link
The thing I've always wondered about is how Check Your Head immediately got to be a big deal if Paul's Boutique wasn't. Was it just that MTV got behind it in a big way or was Paul's Boutique already getting more love in the interim?
― da croupier, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:42 (thirteen years ago) link
as a kid I had no real grasp of what was going on with those guys between the baseball cap Ill videos I saw all the time and the sock hat Check videos I saw all the time
― da croupier, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:44 (thirteen years ago) link
"Hey Ladies" was huge on MTV but it was definitely pushed in a "Doowutchyalike" sort of way, a kitsch goof. No question the record went over almost everyone's head, completely slept-on or at best misinterpreted until after Check Your Head. Definitive ahead-of-its-time record.
― cee-oh-tee-tee, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:47 (thirteen years ago) link
also "non-event" is hyperbole
― and by "Heavens!" i mean WATERFALLS OF BIDDY (HI DERE), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:48 (thirteen years ago) link
All I know is I bought SPIN in March or April '92 and the Beasties were already cover stars with the headline "Best Album Ever?"
― Gucci Mane hermeneuticist (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:49 (thirteen years ago) link
Okay: "total fucking flop" is more accurate.
― Gucci Mane hermeneuticist (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:50 (thirteen years ago) link
croup, "Pass the Mic" was massive as the lead single on MTV. Twinned the rise of street skating and the toughening of rap, moving away from the club.
― cee-oh-tee-tee, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:51 (thirteen years ago) link
True. After I posted that, it occurred to me that there could have been wide swaths of people listening to Biggie in '94 and I wouldn't have necessarily known. Although, as I believe I mentioned upthread, I do remember my friend Chris quoting "Big Poppa." Not sure I realized who it was by at the time, I just thought "lol rap" (or rather "lol at the incongruity of this pale skinny Converse All Star-wearing smart kid reciting mainstream hip-hop lyrics"). (Actually, haha, Chris was a big Beastie Boys fan.)
― jaymc, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:52 (thirteen years ago) link
The thing I've always wondered about is how Check Your Head immediately got to be a big deal if Paul's Boutique wasn't. Was it just that MTV got behind it in a big way or was Paul's Boutique already getting more love in the interim?― da croupier, Tuesday, September 14, 2010 2:42 PM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
― da croupier, Tuesday, September 14, 2010 2:42 PM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
Basically after rap fans abandoned em, they fit snugly into the new post-Nirvana Alternative Nation thingy
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:53 (thirteen years ago) link
"Hey Ladies" charted higher than "Pass the Mic" but I never, ever heard the former on the radio while the alt-rock station in the Twin Cities played the shit out of both "Pass the Mic" and "So What'cha Want"
― and by "Heavens!" i mean WATERFALLS OF BIDDY (HI DERE), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:54 (thirteen years ago) link
You must be talkin' about GARUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNGE
― cee-oh-tee-tee, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:56 (thirteen years ago) link
nah
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:59 (thirteen years ago) link
"So What'cha Want" fit in beside "100%" and "Lithium" a lot more comfortably than "Hey Ladies" did around Richard Marx and Skid Row.
― Gucci Mane hermeneuticist (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 18:59 (thirteen years ago) link
I think another problem faced by Paul's Boutique is that it strongly embraced sampling of various funky 70s tunes at a time when folks were still trying to forget that the 70s had happened. It seems hard to believe now, but 70s nostalgia was kind of a bizarre notion in 1989.
― Moodles, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 19:00 (thirteen years ago) link
'Twas something Mike D said to Tabitha Soren when she tip-toed around "post-Nirvana Alternative Nation thingy", Whines.
― cee-oh-tee-tee, Tuesday, 14 September 2010 19:02 (thirteen years ago) link
Moodles diamond-tip otm
Well, it's sorta true. 1989 and 1990 were also the peak of house crossovers, which pilfered seventies disco left and right.
― Gucci Mane hermeneuticist (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 19:07 (thirteen years ago) link
I don't really know for sure but I think maybe it took a few years for "juicy" to become like the default/best-known b.i.g. song. I'm 31 and I heard "hypnotize" and "big poppa" way before I heard "juicy," but I think maybe for the dudes on here in their 20s, "juicy" had become one of the canonical b.i.g. songs by the time they were seriously into music and/or going to parties like this. just a theory.xpost
― congratulations (n/a), Tuesday, September 14, 2010 7:04 AM Bookmark
is otm, as it did take a while for it to become biggie's legacy song ahead of his bigger hits, but deej and lex are right about "juicy" getting played at all types of parties. it peaked at #27 btw, not #72.
― markers garvey (The Reverend), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 20:48 (thirteen years ago) link
i'm totally on deej & lex's side re: "juicy" (also re: gucci mane -- whiney lives in williamsburg, let's remember this) -- seriously everyone i knew in high school would instantly know that "it was all a dream" was the opening line of "juicy", or at the very least a song by notorious BIG -- and i went to a not very diverse high school
must be an age thing? i have no idea -- & all my friends then just listened to the strokes
― banaka socka flame (J0rdan S.), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 23:07 (thirteen years ago) link
i think it might also be because i (and presumably you and deej) never actually hung out exclusively with people who shared our music taste in school or university
― لوووووووووووووووووووول (lex pretend), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 23:10 (thirteen years ago) link
i think theres some history rewriting going on if ppl think juicy is a canon biggie song only in retrospect or something
― you cant see me markers (deej), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 23:21 (thirteen years ago) link
It depends on where you were when the canon was being compiled.
― Gucci Mane hermeneuticist (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 23:32 (thirteen years ago) link
first off, none of my friends listened to the Strokes, J0rdan...in fact I don't think I hung out with people who listened to the Strokes until prolley 2004-2005, by then of course they were past their prime: so it goes...
I told my good friend/recent neighbor that I only heard Juicy for the first time a few days ago and he nodded, unsurprised, noting that I was white and that I never went out. I'm sure he was reaffirming in his head that Biggie was neither obscure nor European nor active musically in the 70s (as per his usual dogging on me...)
― i wish them hell and happiness (Drugs A. Money), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 23:57 (thirteen years ago) link
― Gucci Mane hermeneuticist (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, September 14, 2010 6:32 PM (25 minutes ago) Bookmark
i guess if you werent listening to the 'rap canon' when the 'rap record in question' was being released then you might somehow have missed one of its 'biggest artists' 'biggest songs'
― you cant see me markers (deej), Tuesday, 14 September 2010 23:58 (thirteen years ago) link
not sure why i went all out w the scare quotes there
OK so now we're arguing about what kind of bros we befriended ten or fifteen years ago.
― Gucci Mane hermeneuticist (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:03 (thirteen years ago) link
it seems totally reasonable to think that there are tons and tons of people (young people, old people, people in between) who still haven't heard juicy
― having taken an actual journalism class (contenderizer), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:08 (thirteen years ago) link
arguments like this are totally infuriating because people conflate "EVERYONE IN MY HIGH SCHOOL" with "everyone that I actually hung out/talked to in high school"
and then when I introduced the word "diverse" to describe my high school, I meant "including a huge cross-section of cowboys and skaters who didn't give two fucks about biggie" people immediately started using diverse to mean "lots of blacks and latinos went to my high school"
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:26 (thirteen years ago) link
Also, remember that entire reign of BIG, from the premiere of "Juicy" through his death occured WHILE I was in high school, so these weren't yet "rap classics," they were "songs on the radio"
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:29 (thirteen years ago) link
ie, like J0rdan said, it might be an age thing
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:30 (thirteen years ago) link
my hs was about 2% black. :/
― markers garvey (The Reverend), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:38 (thirteen years ago) link
ppl mostly listened to like...limp bizkit and eminem, except for the younger kids who all seemed to listen to emo
― markers garvey (The Reverend), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:39 (thirteen years ago) link
'Twas something Mike D said to Tabitha Soren when she tip-toed around "post-Nirvana Alternative Nation thingy", Whines.― cee-oh-tee-tee, Tuesday, September 14, 2010 3:02 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark
― cee-oh-tee-tee, Tuesday, September 14, 2010 3:02 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark
Ha, yep. Whenever grunge comes up I almost always get a little "You must be talkin' about GARUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNGE" earworm from that clip. God knows how many years later it is now. Damn you, Mike D!
― Position Position, Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:40 (thirteen years ago) link
even the fucking nerds sitting around listening to talking heads at the age of 12 knew what "it was all a dream/ i used to read 'word up' magaine" is from is what i'm saying
that's like the most iconic line rap music, or so i thought
― banaka socka flame (J0rdan S.), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:40 (thirteen years ago) link
Stereotypes of a white indie male misunderstoodAnd it's still all good
― Gucci Mane hermeneuticist (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:42 (thirteen years ago) link
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Tuesday, September 14, 2010 7:26 PM (14 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
this is not what i meant weirdo. at my h.s. white ppl were really really into rap too .... u couldnt throw a wallaby w/out hitting a white dude who bought 'wu tang forever' the day it was released
― you cant see me markers (deej), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:42 (thirteen years ago) link
and at my college, white frat dudes all listened to / knew biggie songs!! esp juicy!! as did ... everyone?? its a totally standard obvious rap classic
― you cant see me markers (deej), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:43 (thirteen years ago) link
it was a single! with a video! from one of the most well known rappers of the nineties! his first crossover hit!
― you cant see me markers (deej), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:44 (thirteen years ago) link
man, you really travel in some circles full of not exceptionally diverse white people then
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:46 (thirteen years ago) link
is that it? are we all the same to you, deej?
at my h.s. most of the white ppl were not really really into rap and those that were were really really westcoast-centric. more likely to talk up brotha lynch than biggie.
j0rdan's post is weirding me out tho. i never even heard of talking heads til i was in college (although i knew "genius of love" at that time)
― markers garvey (The Reverend), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:48 (thirteen years ago) link
i was mad into Talking Heads in like 7th grade
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:49 (thirteen years ago) link
― Whiney G. Weingarten, Tuesday, September 14, 2010 7:46 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
how does that compute? yr 'pulling a whiney' itt
― you cant see me markers (deej), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:51 (thirteen years ago) link
i don't remember hearing biggie on the radio at all until "hypnotize", although i do remember seeing "big poppa" on mtv at the time. only east coast rap i remember hearing on the radio here at all from like 94-late 96 (coincidence w/ tupac's death or no?) is ll cool j.
― markers garvey (The Reverend), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:53 (thirteen years ago) link
whiney has a point, dude. i knew tons of white ppl in hs that didn't f/w rap.
― markers garvey (The Reverend), Wednesday, 15 September 2010 00:54 (thirteen years ago) link