Jadakiss Shares His "25 Most Essential Songs" With Complex

Complex.com recently caught up with rapper Jadakiss to get his personal take on his “Most Essential Songs.” Jadakiss came up with a list of 25 songs featuring everyone from Lil’ Kim to DMX.

The Yonkers rapper also spoke on each of the 25 songs explaining how a song came about, how other artists got involved, what it was like working in the studio and more.

One of the 25 songs Jadakiss listed was the 1997 hit “It’s All About The Benjamins (Remix)” featuring Puff Daddy, The Lox, The Notorious B.I.G., and Lil’ Kim. In his conversation with Complex, Jadakiss explained how he helped in writing a small portion of Diddy’s part on the song.

“[Puff] had the beat from The Hitmen. But the rhyme, his first intro, ‘Now, what y’all wanna do, wanna be ballers…,’ I wrote that. I was rhyming in the MIDI room amongst us, we were trading rhymes, me and Styles and whoever was there. He came in, heard me saying that, and was like, ‘I need that!’ Then he put that on the ‘Benjamins’ beat,” said Jadakiss. “He had laid it, but me and Sheek didn’t put nothing down yet. We didn’t really like the beat.”

Jadakiss also added “Blackout” with DMX and Jay-Z, one of The Lox’s first songs while signed to Ruff Ryders, to his “Most Essential Songs” list.

“We were heavy Ryders now. We got off Bad Boy, we’re home sweet home with Ruff Ryders, able to ventilate, say anything we want, comfortable in our skin,” Jadakiss explained. “We were going to Cali for a month, or a few weeks or so, for a video or something. I know we were going to be over there recording. And that was the first song we got in there…Hov was moving around touring. If you hear his verse he was kinda sick. We were catching him in transition before he went to London. And X was already in beast mode. Second album right? Yeah, he had the fire under his ass.”

Other songs included on Jadakiss’ list include “Banned From TV,” “Reservoir Dogs,” and “Kiss Of Death.”

13 thoughts on “Jadakiss Shares His “25 Most Essential Songs” With Complex”

by the look of things, they songs he was featured on. “blackout” is one of the hottest cuts he’s ever spit rhymes on. back when hip-hop was good and raw

i agree hellrazor those were the days…

great interview stan ipcus. If you dont know go to school. that would be dope if ipcus and jadakiss collaborated.

All for the Love needs to be #1

EddieMurrrphy says:

June 4, 2011 at 8:00 AM

YES! finally someone else that sees the awesomeness in that song. that shit bangs hard to me i love that track always have, easily my favorite cut off the first lox album. i think that may be my favorite swizz beats beat, before he turned all whistle tweets and hand claps. that track is sick im glad to see other people still give it rep

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