Can everyone stop trying to rewrite history for Ja Rule

[JustCKing]

im not gonna bother with the 1st comment.

youre saying that nas & prodigy were in jay's way??? the rappers jay dissed on takeover were dudes that were perceived to be on their last legs or done.
the rappers that were in jay's way at the time were jadakiss & DMX. and clearly jay wanted no parts of them. that's how the whole State prop/Dblock thing started in the 1st place.

ja & luda were neck-n-neck in terms of sales but jarule was a polarizing figure and his singles had way more impact/influence than anything Ludacris did.

im saying if fat joe didn't keep ashanti's vocals on his record, irv would've never got the idea to put her album out PERIOD. its been spoken on.

I already said being tied to an established rapper & label is a good look. what more do you want?? youre trying to make it seem like ashanti str8 piggy-backed off of jarule. she had her own fans and dropped music that quite frankly had more meaning to people than jarule's stuff.

concrete rose went platinum. we're not comparing it to her previous albums. we're talking about whether or not it made noise. stop trying to move the goal-post.​

Prodigy and Nas, especially Nas, were in Jay's way. Nas is a rapper who Jay himself claimed was Top 3. Prodigy was staking his claim at the top spot. X was huge, but he wasn't looked at in the same light as Nas and Prodigy in regard to emceeing. Jada wasn't either.

Ja being a polarizing figure is neither here or there. Luda was still a bigger deal than Ja especially if we're talking about MC's. Luda definitely had that respect.

 

[Wacky D]

Ja was THAT dude from 2000-mid 2003. His supply and demand was crazy. That J lo record and Between me and you was what broke him. Not a big fan but he had it LOCKED

PUT IT ON ME was the record that broke him.

that was the one.

As for as his impact on the culture, Ja Rule didn't start the denim jacket/jean, cornrow, bandanna combo. CMR was already on that wave as was Mystikal. This was kind of a Southern thing.

lol @ that being a southern thing.

the south was like 2-years behind when they started dressing like that. theyre always a couple years behind in fashion.

not saying jarule started it tho. but he was dressing like that long before CMR & mystikal.
​

Prodigy and Nas, especially Nas, were in Jay's way. Nas is a rapper who Jay himself claimed was Top 3. Prodigy was staking his claim at the top spot. X was huge, but he wasn't looked at in the same light as Nas and Prodigy in regard to emceeing. Jada wasn't either.

Ja being a polarizing figure is neither here or there. Luda was still a bigger deal than Ja especially if we're talking about MC's. Luda definitely had that respect.

lol. you've been on the rap forums too long buddy. you don't know what youre talking about. jadakiss was the hottest thing on the streets, and DMX had yet to fall off with the great depression. Nas & prodigy werent poppin. prodigy was on his last legs and people thought Nas was about done too. THATS WHAT JAY-Z DOES. he throws shots at artists & trends that are on the downslide, in hopes of being credited for their demise. jadakiss was the guy he was SUPPOSED to battle but he hid behind beans. hell, the entire year leading up to that point, jay was pulling sucka moves in hopes of neutralizing jada's buzz.

jarule as simply a bigger draw than Ludacris. ja being a polarizing figure has everything to do with it actually. and his music reasonated better, and he had the broads on lock. Ludacris being the better emcee is neither here nor there. its not like either of them were particular great emcees. they were just aiird in that category. emceeing wasn't the selling point for either of them. ​

 

[razassin]

Ja was a very famous rapper for a while lets not kid ourselves. He had Irv Gotti n Def Jam behind him. Irv was one of the top behind the scenes guys at the time and def jam was the biggest hip hop label at the moment.

Irv Gotti who was the brains n the one responsible for Jas success was tryina team him up with NYs top rap acts at the time: X n Jay.

He had constant hits from 99 with ''holla holla'' to 03 with ''always on time''

Even tho I hated his deep voice on corny love songs from the beginning as a kid n then as a teen I had to endure his wackness 24/7 on TV n radio

N Im pretty sure he prolly got like 3 or 4 platinum albums which does put him in a different tier in hip hop history

STILL NO nikkaZ WAS fukkIN WITH JA RULE ONLY HOZ MAN! His music never caught in the hood and I am from Jamaica Queens... Im from the nikkaz boro, if his shyt didnt get played here by the hood I cant imagine it did anywhere else.

He did pop crossover rap for hoz thats why he was a ''big'' act at the time, but he was never talked about as a top emcee or did his shyt ever get played by the homies!

Conclusion:

was he ever popular from 99-03? Yeah a multi platinum sellin artist

was he ever respected in hip hop? NEVER!!!!

 

[Kool Kitty Kat]

I always liked Ja, maybe not all of his hit songs though, but his first album is definitely close to a classic and so is "Blood In My Eye". Most people i know never fukked with him though. They just thought he was another rapping makin love songs for the women. I don't really know a lot of people who listen to those joints on the regular. He never was loved the same way that Pac and DMX was.

 

[Jimmy Two-Times™]

Ja was THAT dude from 2000-mid 2003. His supply and demand was crazy. That J lo record and Between me and you was what broke him. Not a big fan but he had it LOCKED

Until Gawdfather came thru and crushed the buildings.

It makes 50's win these past 15 years that much sweeter.

 

[Wacky D]

I'm sorry but this has been bothering me for days now and I initially didn't want to touch it, but am I the only one who sees zero significance in how hip hop heads of the early 2000s viewed Ja? Sure, if we are talking about the historical record, fine, the facts are the facts and they didn't fukk with him, but citing them as something that matters when determining anything about Ja's music quality is complete nonsense.

The nikkas that hated Ja are the same nikkas that thought It Was Written was sellout trash because he dared to be different. That's how they reasoned back then, music type was more important than music quality. Mase also got way more criticism than his music ever warranted, and LL cool J had to force out dishonest, generic street records between his pop/female hits just to save face with that audience. Its like if you stepped out of the grimy nikka archetype, just slightly, you were risking your entire career because the culture was that intolerant. Personally, fukk 'em, hip Hop heads from that era were some of the most close minded, anti-free thinking people that I ever came across. They were the livin npc meme.

jarule's lack of buzz with the serious rap crowd is very significant. otherwise, jarule's run wouldn't have ended in the matter that it did.

as far as jarule's music quality goes, I liked jarule's 1st couple albums, but neither of them were standout LPs. his run was fueled off of r&b and pop singles. that's the difference between jarule and a guy like LL Cool J, who is one of the goats and has 3 certified classic albums, and then a few more albums that we don't even get around to speaking on, that are better than any LPs jarule ever dropped.

mase gets criticized because he was one of the biggest sellouts ever.

as for "it was written", youre going into a completely different era, to the point where a lot of the people who hated jarule, were actually kids when IWW came out and liked the album. some of them didn't even know about the backlash it received or the climate of the era. also, nas didn't do anything new with that album. he followed trends in hopes of doing numbers. AND AGAIN, that's a whole different era. hip-hop was way more commercial when jarule was having his run. he wouldn't have even been able to exist with most of those records he made in a year like '96. besides, he was too busy making 2pac diss tracks back then.​

 

[Feed-Me]

Ja had the streets on lock the same way Drake, Nelly etc did. Everyone bumped it but nobody takes em seriously as mcs or legitimate street threats. When you that popular you will have streets on lock. Nikkas and especially they girls listen to popular music. But Ja, Nelly Drake type nikkas never had the streets on lock in the way they were never selling mega bootleg ish. What was the best Ja mixtape? What are some of Jas non album cuts the hood fukked wit? There was none

 

[TrifeGod]

SOmeone posted that vlad interview about some crazy battle he had, didn't Redman say he was basically lying

 

[chickenteriyaki]

Who's fake account is this?

?

 

[KingsOfKings]

 

[banner34]

Classic

 

[Whips-n-Chains]

Ha was always trash…anyone around in 2002 remembers how awful that shyt was

 

[Pool_Shark]

Bump

 

[Whips-n-Chains]

No one was rocking with Ja in real time, and the world was delighted when 50 ended him.

 

[Greenhornet]

untrue and the track record proves it

he had more hits than alot of rappers and people bumped his first 3 CDs

he was losing steam by the 3rd one though and 50 had his foot on his neck
then Ja started looking really corny and was looked at like the short ego centric 2pac clone that he was

and 50 had too much strength and charisma as well as mixtape run and momentum to stop