Just My Thoughts: “I Go Off”

1) Beanie Sigel is in the zone right now.

I'd be excited about "What You Talkin Bout" and "I Go Off," even if he wasn't dissing Jay-Z. Beanie Sigel is rapping about as well as he ever has. I never thought the guy was wack, but I wasn't as big a fan, back when he was pioneering the art of ending every bar with the same damn word, and getting all emotional about not having a father, his sizzurp addiction and what have you. I'm surprised the years spent behind bars and abusing substances haven't caused him to lose a step. Maybe he's focusing really hard, to draw a contrast with Jay's lame-ass rhymes on the Blueprint 3. Similarly, I wouldn't be surprised if that's why he's rapping over such hard beats, rather than that baroque, post-Blueprint soul rap bullshit he used to rap over.

2) Again with the Jacko references.

Beanie Sigel is a very emotional boy. He must still be broken up over the death of Michael Jackson, and that's why he keeps bringing him up. How else to explain the fact that he mentions Wacko Jacko in both "What You Talkin Bout" and "I Go Off." I could see if they were songs about nothing in particular, like a lot of rap songs, and Michael Jackson came up as something that happened to be zeitgeisty. His death is definitely one of the year's biggest news stories, like the election was last year. But whoever heard of mentioning Michael Jackson in a dis song, unless it's a song about Prodigy from Mobb Deep? I'm not sure how this ties in, except maybe on a subconscious level, but I'll point out that, at the end of the first verse, he mentions something about pushing another guy's shit in, like a colonic.

3) Jay ain't the only one who can rip off Biggie.

Is the part where he quotes from "Who Shot Ya" meant to mock Jay-Z for ripping off so many lines from Biggie over the course of his career, or is it just one of those weird coincidences, like the fact that he also references Michael Jackson, and Jacko and Biggie, who are both dead now, once did a song together? If you wanted to, I'm sure you could find all sorts of weird coincidences like that. For example, Jacko once sorta kinda did a song with Jay-Z. Does that mean Jay-Z is gonna die? Or is he a shapeshifter? The Biggie lines follow a reference to Pac and precede a reference to Kanye, so it could all just be free association, like how a reference to Michael Jackson - and children, even - just so happens to follow a line about fucking someone in the ass. It's funny, sometimes, the way the mind works.

4) Fiddy had the good sense not to rap on this.

Who else, when they heard 50 Cent kick the chorus, worried that he'd also kick a verse and that it would suck balls just like every other verse of his, but was relieved when all he did was talk shit at the end of the song, which is his real strong suit? I've heard funnier shit-talk codas from Fiddy, but he brings up a good point in this one. All Jay-Z had to do was cut Beanie Sigel a check and this wouldn't have been an issue. Never mind whether Beanie or the rest of these bums deserve a handout - it might still be cheaper than having to worry about 50 Cent paying them to dis him. Jay probably figured he was cool, as long as there weren't any problems in his relationship with Beyonce. We don't know any other women he's been with. (Hmm...) The closest Fiddy could get to giving Jay the Rawse treatment is that video with Kelly Rowland.

5) Please let there be an album.

Alas, this Beanie Sigel bullshit will blow over without the vast majority of Jay-Z fans (readers of O: The Oprah Magazine, etc.) even knowing about it. Fiddy himself said Beanie Sigel isn't signed to G-Unit, and he might not bother signing him, if there isn't a business case for it. "I Go Off" might just be a one-off, to generate interest in Before I Self Destruct. Why should Jay-Z give a shit? Unless, that is, 50 Cent does decide to sign Beanie Sigel, and they put out an entire album going at Jay-Z. Imagine an entire album of songs like "I Go Off," with Beanie Sigel dropping improbably well-written stream of consciousness references to Michael Jackson, and fucking people in the ass, and dead rappers from the '90s, over the gulliest of beats, and with Fiddy dropping hilarious shit-talk codas on every song. I'd buy that album on GP. No homo.