78. Pharoahe Monch - Simon Says (Rawkus. 1999. From the LP Internal Affairs)
Mike Dikk: "Dun nuh nunuh….GET THE FUCK UP!" I still can’t get over the fact that Pharoahe Monch had a bonafide mainstream hit with one of the most memorable choruses and samples ever and then completely disappears from MTV just like that. He’s still there in spirit though, since they still use the Simon Says Intro or "Dun nuh nunuh" part anytime the shit’s about to pop off on one of their dumb reality shows.
I’m not a complete retard and I know Monch has some serious underground clout, and I think the reason he never had a proper followup was because of record label bullshit, but even Craig Mack had a remix. Oh wait, there is a "Simon Says" remix. I guess he really did achieve complete mainstream hip hop one hit wonder status then.
All joking aside, this is a vicious song, and I think any decent person could listen to the beat on a loop forever, which is probably why the remix is like 38 minutes long. It’s just kind of odd when someone with so much underground clout with a big hit fell off when Mos Def has been living off of Black Star fame for the past six years. Monch is due to release a new record within the next few months, but I don’t think it will have the success "Simon Says" did, but hopefully enough people outside of the internet dorkery underground remember him, so he can make the money he probably never saw from "Simon Says".
Raven Mack: I lived in a trailer once with a dude who was starting middle linebacker at a Division III ultra-white school, and all he was about was the gangsta shit. He'd lift weights outside and drink forties of Private Stock that I bought for him and when we freestyled, he'd freestyle all fast like southern rap, which I never could get my tongue around at that point in life. The only non-gangsta shit that my roommate liked, for some odd reason, was Organized Konfusion. He played them all the time, because I was simultaneously on that Rawkus shit and on the Illuminati-paranoid Wu-Tang B-level shit (Killa Army, Sunz of Man, etc.), and I guess he thought this was our only common ground. He would explain to me over and over how brilliant Organized Konfusion was, which was far less annoying than the internet explaining it to me, because the internet never explained it to me while we played dice at the kitchen table with some frilly girls from Sweet Briar College on the way over. Of course, I was beyond college, workingman, and none of those frilly girls with fatty pockets would look twice in my direction, because we lived in a trailer and I was a drunkard housepainter, not a cute crazy rich kid in college.
Pharoahe Monch seemed like he was gonna blow up large, MTV-style, but his skills have always been about the same, which is above average, but who the fuck cares about skills? This song is all about that beat, which if you ever heard in an actual club, it vibrates your ribcage and makes you want to drink beer and try to touch titties before the night is out. I don't even remember what the fuck Monch rhymes about - could've been about deciphering hieroglyphics or breaking down the human genome, but all that song does is get me hyped the fuck up. Punch your grandma in the face, steal her handicap-accessible minivan and drive it off a cliff, jumping out the door right before you hit the edge, all with a double-sized blunt in your mouth and two high gravity double deuces clanking around in your jacket pocket type hyped the fuck up.
Download: Pharoahe Monch - Simon Says BONUS MATERIAL: Simon Says (Remix. Feat. Lady Luck, Redman, Method Man, Shabaam Sahdeeq and Busta Rhymes)
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