Oh. My. God. Becky...
Who needs a new king when we have rap royalty to talk about?
Here’s a fun trivia question –
What musician from Seattle had the biggest hit in 1992?
My mind instantly went to Nirvana and the grunge bands of that era.
But it turns out the biggest hit from Seattle that year came from a rapper.
And when I heard that, I was curious…
Not sure which song I’m referring to?
Here’s a clue: It begins with a woman speaking the infamous line:
“Oh. My. God. Becky…Look at her butt!”
That’s right – the biggest hit out of Seattle in 1992 was Baby Got Back, by Seattle rap royalty, Sir Mix-a-Lot.
Travel back with me to the 1990s…when the idea of a beautiful woman’s body in America was…thin.
Or thinner.
Sir Mix-a-Lot (aka ‘Mix’, and Anthony Ray) and his girlfriend Amylia Dorsey-Rivas were watching the Super Bowl when they saw a Budweiser commercial featuring Spuds MacKenzie (the original party animal!)…and a bunch of women in bikinis.
“Each one was shaped like a stop sign, with big hair, [and] straight-up-and-down bird legs,” Mix said.
At the time, Rivas – a curvy, half-Mexican, half-black woman – was struggling to get modelling work.
“I didn’t get much work, and neither did anyone who looked like me,” she said.
“And it made Mix angry. He’d say ‘I don’t understand why you can’t get modelling work,’ and I’d say, ‘Look behind me.’”
“This was my experience he was writing about.”
“Black men like curves,” Mix explained.
“When they’re crooning to women about how beautiful they are in an R&B song, the ladies you see in the video don’t reflect what those guys like.
“Every time an R&B video was on, I heard women say, ‘I just saw him down in Oakland, and his girls wasn’t like that.’”
“That made me think that this was more than a funny song, and it wrote itself.”
Mix worked on the song as part of a new album with famed producer Rick Rubin.
He sent a few songs to Rubin, including a slower version of Baby Got Back.
Rubin told Mix they came off as ‘gangster’, which didn’t work for a rapper from Seattle.
So Mix decided to scrap his original version of Baby Got Back and make it more uptempo.
When Rubin listened to the finished track, he told Mix:
‘People are gonna be talking about this 20 years from now.’
But Mix wasn’t sure Baby Got Back was the strongest song on the album, and he convinced Rubin to release One Time’s Got No Case as the first single.
The song didn’t get much attention.
And now Rubin knew he needed a video to accompany Baby Got Back, and brought in music video director Adam Bernstein (whose video credits included Love Shack for the B-52s and Hey Ladies for the Beastie Boys).
But Mix had a vision for the music video – one that involved… a giant ass.
Bernstein took inspiration from the works of French fashion photographer Jean-Paul Goude, and worked with a team to create a 50-foot-ass out of pencil-steel and fiberglass.
It was painted gold to reflect the song’s lyrics: “Some brothers wanna play that hard role/And tell you that the butt ain’t gold.”
Mix was also particular about the women who appeared in the video, and insisted on “butt approval” for all the dancers.
After the dancers auditioned, Bernstein took Polaroid pictures of their backsides – and FedExed them to Mix in Seattle for approval.
Although Mix and Bernstein had some creative differences about the video, they worked together on the “nuances” of the edit, and Mix was happy with the final product.
Baby Got Back was released on April 11, 1992 – and it quickly climbed the charts, taking the No. 1 spot on May 7, 1992.
That’s when controversy found Mix.
The music video for Baby Got Back had been banned by MTV.
“Now I think my career is over,” Mix said.
“I remember talking to Heidi Robinson, Rick Rubin’s publicist, and she said, ‘No, no! Now you’re the forbidden fruit – now you’re really gonna sell some records!’”
According to Patti Galluzzi, MTV’s then-senior vice president of music and talent, the issue was that MTV had recently instituted a rule against showing female body parts with no reference to face (think Warrant’s video Cherry Pie).
And not everyone picked up the message Mix was trying to convey with his song.
“It was a lot more serious than a lot of people thought it was,” he said.
“The song doesn’t just say I like large butts, you know?
“The song is talking about women who damn near kill themselves to try to look like these beanpole models that you see in Vogue magazine.
“Girls who didn’t have big butts thought the song was cute, but girls who did have butts thought it was a revolution.”
But fortunately, Mix had good communication skills – and was able to argue his case to Galluzzi.
“Mix told me that he felt that the message of the song is that all women are constantly bombarded with images of super-thin models on TV and in magazines, and he thought that women and young girls need to hear that not everyone feels that way, as well as defending a more African-American body image,” Galluzzi explained.
“He was also speaking directly to me: I had back and front, then and now.
“So I said, ‘You know what? I’ll go back to NYC and bring this to the top.’”
And she did.
“And it worked,” Mix said.
MTV agreed to play Baby Got Back after 9 pm.
Baby Got Back would spend five weeks in the top spot on US Billboard charts, and go on to become the 2nd best-selling song of 1992 (Boyz II Men’s End of the Road took the No. 1 spot).
Mix also took home the Grammy for Best Rap Solo in 1993.
And over the last three decades, Baby Got Back has been featured in films, television shows, and ads – from Charlie’s Angels and Shrek to Friends, Glee, and The Masked Singer (performed by… Sarah Palin).
In 2014 Nicki Minaj sampled the song in her hit Anaconda, while the Seattle Symphony included Mix when they performed the song that same year.
And Mix still loves the song he’s known for.
“I will perform it until I drop,” he said.
Check out Mix’s performance with the Seattle Symphony…
One more thing…
Oh. My. God. Becky…
Amylia Dorsey-Rivas not only helped inspire the song — she’s also the voice you hear talking at the beginning.
“I have about 40 or 50 different voices that I do. There were so many kids coming in and out of my household — my parents had about 40 foster kids; I was adopted — that I picked up lots of different accents.
“The one [at the beginning of] Baby was based on girls I grew up around.
“[Mix] heard me do the voice many times; it comes the easiest of all the voices I do, and he loved it.
That was fun! Hope you enjoyed this trip down memory lane!
And want more nostalgia? Here’s the original video. (Fun Fact: Director Adam Bernstein has gone on to direct episodes of many TV shows, including 30 Rock, Fargo, and Breaking Bad).
But if I ever meet him, I’m asking him about this one.
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How Can I Help?
I’ll keep saying it: Communication matters.
And if you want to improve your communication (and get all the good things that come with that), I’m your gal.
So many companies could reap significant benefits – from performance and culture to retention and engagement – by improving their communication.
So, if you know someone who could benefit from some help (as even the most seasoned leaders do), please get in touch and check out my website for more information.
You can also see my Top 10 list of what I can (and can’t) do for you here.
And if you see any communication examples (the good, the bad, and the ugly) that you think are worth analyzing or sharing, please send them my way!
Until next time, Stay Curious!
-Beth
This was the last song played at my high school grad celebration in 2001 (in Canada) and I will always remember thinking "This is kind of weird but it works?"
Excellent piece!!