I assume it was pettiness at its finest and an unhealthy way of self-healing when Big Sean dropped his hit single “IDFWU” back in 2015.
During the time he had just divorced Glee star Naya Rivera, wherein which she turned around and married actor Ryan Dorsey three months later.My favorite line of the song goes as follows:
Typical. Call the chick you leave behind ‘nuts’ to publicly dismiss emotion.
But after this past Saturday night, when Rivera was arrested and charged with misdemeanor domestic battery after an alleged altercation with her husband Ryan Dorsey, he may have been telling the truth the whole time.
As reported by local news station WSAZ, on Saturday night in Kanawha County, West Virginia, police responded to a domestic violence complaint from Dorsey who claimed that Rivera struck him in the head and face.
According to the reports, his bruises were consistent with his claims, and further evidence was backed up by the video taken during the alleged incident.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMuAZd-vMOg
Rivera called off her divorce from Dorsey last month after a year-long separation, which is ironic, seeing that it was her father-in-law who paid her $1000 PR bond.
Shortly after the report came out, Big Sean took to his Twitter tweeting a video many are calling “shady.” The footage is of a little girl emphatically saying,
“I told y’all n—–. I told y’all n—–. Y’all thought I was playing, but I told y’all n—–.”
While we can chuckle now, seeing that Sean has found love and the presumed “bad guy” is in jail, we must overlook a blaring problem that exists: domestic violence against men.
Research conducted in an American Journal of Public Health report found that half of [violent relationships] were reciprocally violent.
In non-reciprocally violent relationships, women were the perpetrators in more than 70% of the cases. Meaning women initiate domestic violence more than men, men just under-report it.
If incidents such as Rivera’s are just laughed at and not addressed, men will continue to keep silent and women will continue to feel as if they can get away with putting their hands on men.
Solange attacked Hov in the elevator and got cheered on. Ray Rice attacked his girl back and got crucified. The rules not the same.
We’re back again celebrating this Throwback Thursday with 10 more of your favorite rappers’ first videos.
Like before, we’re taking a look into the foundation that you’re favorite artists like Nicki Minaj and Drake were built on. You could say we’re clowning these artists but hey, I didn’t tell them to look like that.
Some of these songs are good and some of these songs are trash but one thing they have in common is they’re all hilarious to see.
These videos serve as a reminder that no one starts off lit. Artists have to earn their flame, it isn’t there right out the gate.
Without further ado here’s 10 of your favorite rappers’ first music videos:
Big Sean
In this video we have a 14-year-old Big Sean raising awareness to the dangers of sex and drug use. Before getting into the video my son even got a nice little news segment to speak on the issues.
“Too many of these rappers are using sex for sale-” BOY DON’T YOU HAVE A SONG WHERE THE HOOK IS “ASS ASS ASS ASS ASS ASS”?
Jokes aside, as a grown man obviously his perspective has changed since he was 14. That doesn’t make him and his little clean bean self any less hilarious.
The song is actually really dope for a 14-year-old, he sounds great even rapping about abstinence and being drug free.
Denzel Curry
All this video tells me is that Denzel Curry is relatable as fuck. Clips of him playing the Naruto video game, skateboarding, and feeling badass in a Halloween mask just scream youth.
The Florida rapper has evolved in about 100 different ways since this video but even in his innocence the man was still spitting. It isn’t the most polished song ever but he’s dropping bars, can’t hate on that.
Nicki Minaj
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MItv-PTKaE
Oh y’all thought Nicki couldn’t rap? Hov said it best “If skills sold, truth be told, I’d probably be lyrically Talib Kweli. Truthfully I wanna rhyme like Common Sense but I did 5 mill’ – I ain’t been rhyming like Common since”
This is Nicki in her purest form. Straight from Queens, real raw, rapping over a Biggie beat.
The surgery jokes are lame at this point, can we just acknowledge how she completely bodied this track?
Childish Gambino
Before Donald Glover realized he was amazing at everything he was spitting bars on “Freaks and Geeks.” This song is essential nerd rap but that’s not discrediting Gambino because he was really spitting.
The evolution of Gambino from this video to seeing him win Emmys and make albums like Awaken My Love is incredible. We don’t get a lot of goofy Gambino anymore so enjoy it while it’s here.
Danny Brown
First of all, peep the swag. Danny Brown was on his real dope boy shit in this video.
I love finding gems like this because it proves that Danny Brown was always nice. Danny’s never been a phony and that shows through this video. Grimy, dirty, and raw as fuck.
ScHoolboy Q
ScHoolboy Q is my favorite rapper. This video shows exactly why. My boy was broke as fuck and he made sure it showed.
Before “Collard Greens” and “tHat Part,” Q was making survival music. If you know what it feels like to be poor you feel this music video personally.
This was before he got fat too, Q been through about 20 transformations throughout the years.
Tyga
I remember hearing this song all the time, this is legitimately the first time I realized it was Tyga. T-Raw has never been afraid of being corny and in turn he’s made some real hits.
Everyone looks stupid before they get money and Tyga isn’t safe from that rule. The video isn’t anything special, pretty par for the course in 2008. Sheesh… realizing Tyga has been in the game for 10 years just feels weird to me.
G Herbo & Lil Bibby
This video is a classic, deadass. I remember being in high school not understanding how Lil Bibby looked like that with a voice like that. The two artists have elevated way past what anyone would have thought and this is the video that started it all.
This video was kind of like a perfect storm. During the peak of Chicago’s drill scene these two came in with bars throughout the whole track shaking up the format their city created.
A young G Herbo and Lil Bibby made an accidental hit, which ended up getting sampled by Nicki Minaj a few years later.
Drake
Has there ever been a glo up more impressive than Drake’s? I almost forgot how the giant blazer with jeans and sneakers was a thing back then.
Drake is now hip-hop’s biggest star and he’s been in his own lane from the start. This video caters to the women who ultimately put Drake where he is today.
The song is fire too and if you had Myspace you’ve heard this shit once or twice.
When Kendrick Lamar released the tracklist for his album DAMN., one detail in particular stuck out. No, it wasn’t the endlessly meme-able album cover, but the presence of U2 as featured artists was deeply worrying.
Yes, worrying.
You see, since the dawn of time hip-hop and rock bands have been collaborating to make wack ass music. Yeah it seems cool to put a popular rock musician and a dope MC on the same song, but it pretty much never works.
The Aerosmith/Run DMC “Walk This Way” track was admittedly fire, and the whole like “oh wow we put a hip-hop group and a rock group together!!” shtick was cool in 1986, but shit got incredibly played out two decades later when everyone was trying to get Chris Martin on a song.
I mean, Kanye and Jay-Z legitimately beefed over the fact that they both made a song with Coldplay. Think about that for a second. On Kanye’s “Big Brother” he raps about being upset about Jay also using Chris Martin on a chorus, “I told Jay I did a song with Coldplay/Next thing I know he got a song with Coldplay/Back in my mind I’m like, ‘Damn, no way’/Translate, español: ‘No way, José'”.
This is #Peak cornball. No one should be beefing over Chris Martin choruses. I mean, “Homecoming” and “Beach Chair” seemed cool at the time… but were they actually? And why is Adam Levine the only other rock musician rappers know?
This all begs the question, “why the shit don’t rappers have better taste in rock music?”
Like, why aren’t there more adventurous collaborations that partner rappers with cooler bands? Take “Clint Eastwood” by Gorillaz and Del the Funky Homosapien as an example of a dope collaboration across genres.
Nothing feels unnatural, the two opposing musical forces bring out the best in each other, as opposed to producing the watered down garbage of the other songs on this list.
Without further ado, I present the wackest rap/rock collaborations of all-time.
“Don’t Wanna Know” Maroon 5 ft. Kendrick Lamar
This song is the musical equivalent of a soft breeze on your face that’s like pleasant at first and you’re like “ahh nice breeze on my face” but then it doesn’t stop and you start getting kinda pissed off and then you wanna fight the wind.
Try listening to this whole song without getting mad. It’s impossible. Kendrick comes on and raps “no more, please stop” which is actually how I feel about this song. Please stop Maroon 5, with your vaguely pleasant bubblegum breeze pop, no one asked for this shit.
Honestly I think Kendrick was clowning Maroon 5 with this verse. They definitely paid him like 5-6 figures (get your bread K-dot) to jump on “Don’t Wanna Know” and then he gave them this verse about selfies and birthdays and shit.
I mean, there’s just no way Kendrick seriously rapped “did he lay it down for you, touch your poona like this?”
You got punk’d Maroon 5.
“Numb/Encore” Jay-Z, Linkin Park
Yeah, I’m sorry to ruin your childhood. I know you thought this shit was popping in 7th grade, but it’s not. It’s very bad.
In 2004 Jay-Z was extremely popular and Linkin Park were extremely popular. Somewhere, in the dark depths of a record label, some moneyed executive hatched the plan to just throw two ridiculously successful musical artists at each other and see what happened.
What happened was the Collision Course EP, which featured Jay-Z songs with Linkin Park production. They reportedly got the idea from Danger Mouse’s Grey Album, which mashed up Hov’s Black Album with The Beatles White Album, which was actually cool. Collision Course was not cool. It was a contrived attempt at making the most money possible off two sets of rabid fans at a time when mashups seemed like the most radical thing to ever happen to music.
Shit was trash.
“Lost!” Coldplay ft. Jay-Z
I don’t mean to pick on Hov, but he made some very questionable decisions in the mid-2000’s when the whole mashup culture was peaking. When it came out, the fact that Jay-Z was on a Coldplay song just seemed so revolutionary.
It wasn’t. It was stupid. Why Jay-Z all the sudden just hopped on the remix of this seemingly random and anonymous Coldplay song is still unclear, but it’s safe to say the whole thing was just awkward.
I mean watch that video, the way it just flashcuts from Chris Martin prancing about in French Revolution cosplay to Jay in a white room by himself rapping about Biggie and Pac.
There was a whole kerfuffle among Coldplay fans about Jay’s use of the n-word on the song, which is a controversy that in and of itself proves this whole thing was ill-conceived.
Rappers, stop listening to Coldplay.
“The Mighty Fall” Fall Out Boy ft. Big Sean
This is actually a match made in heaven. Big Sean, one of the corniest rappers in the game, teaming up with Fall Out Boy, the most bland of the late 2000’s pop-rock revival bands, to make a song that is perhaps the least interesting thing I have ever listened to.
There’s not even really anything to say about this song, but it includes lyrics like “your crooked love is just a pyramid scheme” (Fall Out Boy) and “baby straight up chemistry DNA” (Big Sean). Neither of those things make any sense, like in the least bit.
The fact that this song appears on the album Save Rock and Roll may be the worst part about the whole thing. Like Fall Out Boy, a group made up of anthropomorphized fedoras, were going to save rock and roll with their basic ass Hot Topic soundtrack music. This song makes me sick to my stomach.
“Can’t Stop Partying” Weezer ft. Lil Wayne
I really have no idea what this song is. I can’t believe this song was made. Lil Wayne and Weezer are both great artists in their own right, but I just can’t imagine how anyone thought this song was a good idea.
People just sat around and let Rivers Cuomo sing the chorus “I can’t stop partying, partying/I can’t stop partying, partying/I gotta have Patron/ I gotta have the beat/ I gotta have a lot of pretty girls around me”. My only hope is that this song is some sort of meta joke about party culture and Weezer were secretly trolling us all the whole time.
As for Lil Wayne and rock music, we know these things don’t go together well. Remember that whole rock album thing he did? That entire album could’ve made this list.
To all the rappers out there, stop letting corny pop-rock bands use you to look relevant and edgy. And if you need some power chords, just hit up Korn for chrissake.
