2 Chainz takes the utmost pride in his creativity; he just hopes the lyrics on his upcoming B.O.A.T.S. II: Me Time don’t land him in hot water.
Deuce sat down with MTV News’ Sway Calloway on Tuesday to talk about everything from his pal Kanye West to his new album — even touching on the recent rash of rappers apologizing for their song lyrics. It was something he considered when recording “Feds Watching,” the first single from his forthcoming sophomore album.
On it, Chainz says that he’ll “put that rocket on that mother—-in’ prosecutor.” The song has been out since June and is climbing up the Billboard song chart. So far, no one has publicly expressed a problem with the lyric, but it was enough to make producer Pharrell Williams think twice.
“It actually was brought up. Pharrell brought it up, and then the label brought it up,” 2 Chainz told Sway. “Anything dealing with harming someone like that — an official — they not goin’ for it. It’s almost a cuss word; you almost can’t say it, because this is a government official.”
There’s another lyric on B.O.A.T.S. II that has Chainz worried: “I said, ‘I blew myself up like a Unabomber,’ ” he explained, revealing a song lyric on an unspecified song.
Chainz says the lyric isn’t intended to praise Ted Kaczynski — the infamous “Unabomber,” who was responsible for over a dozen public bombings and three deaths — but rather to give the rapper himself a pat on the back for pulling himself up by his own bootstraps. “My creative side is saying, ‘I blew myself up,’ ” he reasoned.
On Monday, J. Cole and Drake apologized for a lyric that Cole spit on Drizzy’s The Roc Nation MC drew a bit of heat after making light of people who suffer from autism.
In April, Reebok broke off a deal with Rick Ross due to a lyric on Rocko’s “U.O.E.N.O.” Chainz’s “R.A.F.” collaborator, Lil Wayne, saw his deal with Mountain Dew go sour after there was an outcry over his sexual reference to Civil Rights figure Emmett Till on Future’s “Karate Chop.” Tyler, the Creator was also criticized for a trio of Mountain Dew ads he directed that some dubbed racist. The ads were eventually pulled.
“One end, you want to talk about the first amendment, you want to talk about freedom of speech, but on the other end, everything is so delicate, you cannot say anything,” 2 Chainz said. “What hasn’t happened is that we all haven’t stepped up and taken a stand on, ‘We just gonna have freedom of speech.’
“Everything is so delicate, from homosexuality to these diseases that people can’t control, to where, when you’re just trying to be slightly creative and just try to use a metaphor in a different way that people can appreciate, maybe laugh about, it’s taken out of context the wrong way,” he concluded.
No Comments