20 Great Rap Songs Ruined by White People

All of these records are awesome, but we never want to hear them again.

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Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

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The first few weeks after a good song comes out are crucial. Take for example, Kendrick Lamar's recent record, good kid, m.A.A.d city, which, upon initial release, everyone bumped (loudly) because it's awesome, and because it was fresh.

But somewhere down the line...it happens.

It might be on the subway, it might be at work—but it'll definitely happen. Maybe it's your out-of-touch co-worker from the Midwest, or your neighbors who have hobbies like gardening and Sudoku, but there will be a white person who starts singing "Bitch, Don't Kill My Vibe" out of the blue, causing a great song to lose all of its cred.

When this happens, what once was seen as irreverent, new, and subversive has now become mainstream and played out. When your lame friends start posting Cruel Summer lyrics as Facebook statuses and Matt Lauer starts talking about 2 Chainz on The Today Show, shit loses its luster quickly.

We thought about those songs that once stood for something more than a catchy hook and a good beat, before being relegated to intermittent play on Top 40 radio stations for the the masses to get down to during rush hour. Here are 20 great rap songs ruined by white people.

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50 Cent "In Da Club" (2002)

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Album: Get Rich or Die Tryin'
Producer: Dr. Dre
Label: Shady Records, Aftermath Entertainment, Interscope Records

It's a safe bet that we're about five months away from servers at Ruby Tuesdays presenting your free struggle cupcake complete with flaccid candle while singing, "Go shorty, it's your birthday, we gonna party like it's your birthday." This song permeated culture like no other, and for good reason: It's great. But no matter how catchy 50's intro is, or how hard Dre's beat thumps, this track's massive popularity makes it annoying now.

B.G. "Bling Bling" (1999)

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Album: Chopper City in the Ghetto
Producer: Mannie Fresh
Label: Cash Money Records, Universal Records

This is the song that brought the term "bling" to white America. And since then, dads desperately trying to be cool have used it to describe a number of things: shiny rims, shitty watches, and midlife-crisis struggle ear piercings.

Big Pun "Still Not A Player" (1998)

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Album: Capital Punishment
Producer: Knobody, Dahoud & Nomad
Label: Terror Squad/Loud Records

We're pretty sure that 99% of white people pay no attention to the lyrics beyond the chorus. Have you ever heard anyone rap along with "you couldn't measure my dick with six rulers"? Appreciation of Pun's wordplay has largely been pushed to the side in favor of screaming "I'm not a player, I just crush a lot" at the bar, as if it were a sly euphemism rather than a lazy radio edit. It's unfortunate.

Biz Markie "Just A Friend" (1989)

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Album: The Biz Never Sleeps
Producer: Biz Markie
Label: Cold Chillin'/Warner Bros.

Virgins killed this song more than white people, transforming it from a satirical song about dudes not knowing when they're getting played to the de facto international nice guy theme song. If the friend zone were a country, this would be the national anthem. You can thank Mario for rehashing the track years later into an earnest song about unrequited love, but you can thank nerds who took this shit way too seriously in the first place for ruining it.

Black Sheep ‎"The Choice Is Yours" (1991)

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Album: A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing
Producer: Black Sheep
Label: Mercury Records, Polygram Records

This song was ruined by the rodents in that Kia commercial more than white people, but they're just as guilty of getting buck to it in the '90s. Now that they've got kids of their own, it's really tragic that this classic hit is now in the hands of wedding DJs who use it as a tool to get once-hip Generation X'ers to relive that one time they snuck into one of those dangerous rap clubs.

Chamillionaire "Ridin" (2006)

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Album: The Sound of Revenge
Producer: Play-N-Skillz
Label: Chamillitary/Universal Records

This song was supposed to spread an important message about racial profiling...then it went pop. Suddenly, masses of people who will never experience Driving While Black were rapping about it in the most jovial manner possible. No one is trying to catch you riding dirty, bro.

Cypress Hill "Insane in the Brain" (1993)

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Album: Black Sunday
Producer: DJ Muggs, T-Ray
Label: Ruffhouse, Columbia

Weed is now the primary point of entry for white people into hip-hop, and much of that connection is built upon the legacy of Cypress Hill. The recipe for "Insane": the group's "How I Could Just Kill A Man," a pinch of Hannah Field's classic "Puff Puff Give," a Lollapalooza booking, and stir. The melanin-deprived love when rappers get all wacky.

Drake f/ Lil Wayne "HYFR" (2011)

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Album: Take Care
Producer: T-Minus
Label: Young Money, Cash Money, Universal Republic

The music video for this track opens up all sorts of worm cans when it comes to cultural appropriation. What's more ironic, the portrayal of Drake's re-bar mitzvah or the fact that this song is getting play at actual bar mitzvahs? Drake opening the video with found footage from his own childhood is a double-edged sword, on one hand, BABY DRAKE! On the other, you can almost hear your parents asking if you love this shit, if you're high right now, and if you ever get nervous.

Eazy-E "Boyz-N-The-Hood" (1987)

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Album: N.W.A. and the Posse
Producer: Dr. Dre
Label: Ruthless Records

Thank you Dynamite Hack, for taking a genuine song about oppression and inner-city life in the West Coast and turning it into something the drunk guy can play on acoustic guitar. We've all been to that party, the wasted bro finds a guitar, asks everyone to sing along to "Wonderwall," and then he switches it up to this shit to be "edgy." This is the musical equivalent of those racist college parties people had on Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

Eminem "Lose Yourself" (2002)

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Album: Music from and Inspired by the Motion Picture 8 Mile
Producer: Eminem, Jeff Bass
Label: Shady, Aftermath, Interscope

Did this become Em's biggest song because the rest of his catalog was too funky? In the decade since its release, this record has become the go-to "triumphant victory" song. As good as this song is, there's no real reason it belongs on a party playlist, where Eminem's struggle becomes the struggle of a drunk guy to keep beer in his cup while losing himself in the music. Close your eyes for maximum "feeling it" vibes.

Geto Boys "Damn It Feels Good to Be A Gangsta" (1999)

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Album: Uncut Dope
Producer: John Bido
Label: Interscope Records

Mike Judge sealed this song's fate when he included it in Office Space. Now, the Geto Boys are forever associated with TPS reports, PC Load Letter, and red Swingline staplers. At least "Damn It Feels Good To Be A Gangsta" was spared the fate of "Still," which famously provided the background music for the movie's climactic printer scene.

House of Pain "Jump Around" (1992)

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Album: House of Pain
Producer: D.J. Muggs
Label: Tommy Boy

Half of the white people who hear this probably think it's Cypress Hill. The other half are Americans happy to listen to a group that reminds them of their long-forgotten oppressed Irish minority heritage. The transition from the heyday of Fred Astaire to Everlast jumping up and down after four too many Irish Car Bombs says everything about the evolution of white dancers. This song was such a huge, destructive event that it transformed Everlast into a country singer.

Jay-Z f/ Alicia Keys "Empire State of Mind" (2009)

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Album: The Blueprint 3
Producer: Al Shux
Label: Roc Nation, Atlantic Records

In the same manner that everyone is suddenly Irish on St. Patrick's Day, everyone is suddenly a New Yorker when this song comes on. Jay-Z is 100% serious when he calls himself "the new Sinatra." So long, "New York, New York," this is now the default song people think of when they see Times Square and the ever-changing lights of the Empire State Building. And boy, is it annoying as ever. You can currently hear its easily recognizable beat playing in the background of commercials advertising why New York City has so many jobs. Yes, it's like that now.

Jay-Z & Kanye West "N****s In Paris" (2011)

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Album: Watch The Throne
Producer: Hit-Boy, Kanye West, Mike Dean
Label: Roc-A-Fella Records

The funniest possible thing in the world is asking white people what the title of this song is. They always skirt around the first word. "Yeah, I love that 'Paris' song." They'll elaborate with: "you know, the one that goes 'that shit cray,'" while uncomfortably squirming, unsure of what to say next.

Lil Jon & the East Side Boyz "Get Low" (2003)

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Album: Kings of Crunk
Producer: Lil Jon
Label: TVT

Remember how white people didn't know what "skeet" meant until this song got mad radio play? That time seems so foreign and distant now. "Get Low" was definitely a jam, but there's no denying that it's also wildly loud and obnoxious. That effect is amplified triple-fold when the individuals yelling "Til the sweat drop down my balls!" are frat stars with popped collars.

The Notorious B.I.G. "Juicy" (1994)

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Album: Ready to Die
Producer: Poke, Sean "Puffy" Combs
Label: Bad Boy

White folks managed to not only ruin Biggie's track, but the original classic M'Tume jam, as well. Now when "Juicy Fruit" drops, schmucks across the world unite to rap about forgotten cultural touchpoints they remember (Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis) and pretend to remember (Word Up magazine, Mr. Magic and Marley Marl). There's also something just desperately embarrassing about how a song about coming up from poverty has become whitewashed into "remember the '80s"-style VH1-sponsored nostalgia. (Especially considering that VH1 wouldn't have played this song in its heyday).

Outkast "Ms. Jackson" (2000)

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Album: Stankonia
Producer: Earthtone III
Label: Arista Records

People say Outkast were ahead of their time stylistically, musically, and beyond. The music video for "Ms. Jackson" proves that. Not only did this song get sororirty girls amped at college parties, but it also clearly predated the extreme popularity of dog and cat videos by at least a decade. Seriously: a music video with dogs and cats bobbing their heads to the beat and André 3000 walking around a leaky house with a golden retriever puppy and a multicolored scarf. This song was subliminally engineered to make white people love it.

Rob Base and DJ E-Z Rock "It Takes Two" (1988)

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Album: It Takes Two
Producer: Teddy Riley
Label: Profile Records

Rob Base set the tone for every single non-threatening rapper that followed him. You can hear the similarities between his inflection and Vanilla Ice's two years later. This shit was fire back in the day but now would be the rap equivalent of Mac & Me. Thanks to numerous appearances at high school parties hosted by entitled quarterbacks and preppy douchebags who tie sweaters around their shoulders, this song quickly lost street cred and became milquetoast as fuck.

Salt-n-Pepa "Push It" (1987)

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Album: Hot, Cool & Vicious
Producer: Hurby Azor
Label: Next Plateau Records

This song might be a euphemism for sex! [Giggles.] And that is the enduring legacy of Salt-n-Pepa's smash hit, thanks to MTV and the playlists of college bars in the late '80s.

Snoop Dogg "Gin & Juice" (1994)

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Album: Doggystyle
Producer: Dr. Dre
Label: Interscope Records, Death Row Records
West Coast rap has been appropriated in the worst way possible. Any braggadocio and social commentary being told becomes moot when juxtaposed with white bread office jockeys trying to live vicariously through gangster rap. Case in point: "Gin & Juice." How many lame dudes did you know that sang "with my mind on my money and my money on my mind" while making multiple copies of expense reports while wearing a clip-on tie and short-sleeved button down? SMH.

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