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Dead Presidents II
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| "Dead Presidents II" | ||
|---|---|---|
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| Single by Jay-Z | ||
| from the album Reasonable Doubt | ||
| Released | 1996 | |
| Genre | Mafioso rap | |
| Length | 4:26 | |
| Label | Roc-A-Fella Records | |
| Jay-Z singles chronology | ||
| "Can't Knock The Hustle" (1996) |
"Dead Presidents II" (1996) |
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"Dead Presidents II" is a song by rapper Jay-Z off his debut album, Reasonable Doubt. It's lyrical composition of the drug dealing underworld has made it a hip hop classic and a staple in Jay-Z's collection of tracks. The record was the second official single off the album after "Can't Knock the Hustle". The instrumental aspect of this song was taken from a sample of Lonnie Liston Smith's "A Garden of Peace". The song's chorus uses a sample from the Q-Tip remix of "The World Is Yours" by Nas. The use of this sample is fairly notable in hip-hop history as both Nas and Jay-Z would later feud in 2001. Both rappers discussed the merit of the sampling in the song in individual "diss" records. Jay-Z references this argument in his song "Takeover" with the lines, "So yeah, I sampled your voice; you was usin' it wrong/You made it a hot line; I made it a hot song." This was a response to Nas rapping "You show off, I count dough off when you sample my voice" on an unofficial diss known as the "Stillmatic Freestyle" (not to be confused with the "Stillmatic" intro from the album of the same name.)
The song would also officially end the feud between the two rappers, as Jay-Z and Nas performed the song at Jay-Z's 2005 "I Declare War" concert.
Jay-Z makes a reference to the film Pulp Fiction with the line, "I had near brushes, not to mention three shots close range, never touched me, divine intervention."
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