'She Be Puttin' On' single: Review
What the hell is this exactly? Why is this song so mind-numbing and repetitive? It will not be too much of a stretch to say that “She Be Puttin’ On” represents the worst of the hip-hop industry. Let’s face it: Rappers who allow their handlers to give them stage names like “Gucci Mane,” “Waka Flocka Flame,” and “Slim Dunkin” are destined to fail at their so-called art.
The song fails to save itself the moment it plays its first two lines. “She got a car, a job, I swear she stuntin’/She the type I’ll never act violently.” These three guys refuse to hit their girlfriends because their girlfriends are rich…so they basically admit that they’ll be perfectly willing to beat up their girlfriends if they’re poor.
Maybe this song could’ve been good if it’d just been about a rapper who’s proud that his girlfriend is tough and independent, but it’s not. There are lines like “She know I…I’m walking with a slight wallet” and “Chick is know I gonna a rocka deal.” To translate the horrible rap language, these three rappers are bums who can’t make money to support themselves, but they all have rich and beautiful girlfriends because they’re apparently “a rocka deal” and are just that good at sex. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with stay-at-home dads, but stay-at-home dads and moms don’t usually brag about how they have no skills other than screwing and mooching off of other people. It’s a disgrace to actual homemakers.
This song also butchers the English language. Hip-hop songs don’t necessarily need good grammar, but they do need to make a modicum of sense. “That’s when I heard show know to pay her theme song,” “That chopper…I’m big Gucci,” “Chick is know I gonna a rocka deal just cooling I’m a DVD”…what the hell is that supposed to mean? Why randomly mention choppers, theme songs, and DVDs?
On second reading, it could be possible that the “rocka-deal-cooling-DVD” line means Gucci thinks he’ll be able to make more money if he gets (or “rockas”) a major record label deal, but the fact that you have to sit down for several minutes to fish out an alternate meaning just makes it worse. Why not just tell us what you mean directly? At some point, rap slang stops being macho and slides into baby-talk.
The production is barely worth mentioning. It’s slow and repetitive, and the rappers give a listless, lifeless delivery. Like Mario’s recent work, it also appears to have a similar beat to Gucci’s earlier song, “Break Up.”
In short, this song is derivative, un-inspired, and the three rappers play unbelievably un-likeable characters in the lyrics. Why anyone would like this song is beyond me.