Album: Supa Dupa Fly (EastWest/ Elektra; 1997)
Songwriters: TD Bell, Melissa Elliott, Shawntae Harris, W. Hart and Tim Mosley
R&B Peak Position: #4
"I be poppin' fish like some Crisco..."
Wacking out the minds of everyone with the avant-garde sounds and druggy visuals from her defining debut solo single/ video "The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly)", Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott flipped it for something a lil' more accessible (who doesn't get horny?) on it's R&B-tinged follow-up, "Sock It 2 Me".
In a rare instance of overt sampling, Timbaland loops the elephant trunk horn blasts and tip-toe string intro from The Delfonics' 1968 classic "Ready Or Not Here I Come", attaching a commanding militaristic strut to Elliott's cry for coochie love. Starving for the kind of sex that'll leave her walkin' funny for days, "Misdemeanor" initiates her own late-night booty call, demanding he "jump in this B-E-D" and "bring bring bring/ the nasty out of me".
Which such overt carnality wasn't all that strange coming from a female rapper (remember this dropped during what Da Brat calls the "bitch era", when unapologetically nasty femcees Lil' Kim and Foxy Brown ruled the roost), the always unique Elliott took it down a different lane, using her buttery R&B pipes to communicate her desires like some soul diva in heat. But where the verses are sultry and smooth, the "tell-it-like-it-is" chorus lands with the hard-hitting impact of the illest B-girl, spewing out wink-wink braggadoccio ("I can take it like a pro you know") and metaphor-enhanced wit ("My hormones jumpin' like a disco").
The accompanying Hype Williams-directed video, meanwhile, continued her innovative grasping of kooky visuals, suiting her up in a Mega-Man outfit while she and Lil' Kim evade killer robots on a CGI version of Mars.
Best Moment: Da Brat's nyah-nyah-inflected verse closer: "I be the B-R-A-T/ Her be Missy/ And we some bad bitches who be fuckin it up" (3:24)
DL: "Sock It 2 Me" (YFH)
1 comments:
My prayers have been answered! Every song that I grew up listening to, right here! Thank you for doing the research faaarrrr better than I would have. Youre a lifesaver. Im a fan.
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