On this day during 1999, Will Smith's "Wild Wild West"—from the film of the same name—hit no. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 for one and only the one week. If you were of the age that we were were at the time, you thought it was great and couldn't understand why your parents made faces and audible groans when it came on the radio. We now understand how they felt: A) Their own childhoods were being replaced by flashier, special-effect laden versions and B) the song is just ridiculous.
Being a cowboy is a theme that's tough to work into hip-hop, just like being a drug kingpin is tough to work into a country song. Big & Rich aren't real cowboys but at least it doesn't seem forced or ironic, just like how Rick Ross isn't a real drug dealer. Nonetheless, rappers have continued to try. Check out our list of cowboy-themed rap songs for the best, and mostly worst, examples.
06) "Cocaine Cowboy" by Yo Gotti (2013)
In Gotti's defense, he doesn't try to dress his The Mixtape track up at all, just like how he didn't dress up the title to the mixtape it was on. He brings in aggressive beats and proclaims himself to be a cocaine cowboy, a theme that was understood from his first seven Cocaine Muzik mixtapes. Gotti, for all of his sincerity, is simply not the most impressive of lyricists. There is a line where he claims to be "a dope boy like I'm from Detroit," but we doubt that's a reference to another cowboy song coming soon.
05) "Cowboy" by Eve (2001)
Eve goes even further in her lack of Western references by not mentioning the word "cowboy" or anything of the type during this 2001 track. Paying attention to the lyrics reveals a potential subliminal meaning for the song however: Eve considers herself to be a cowboy or groundbreaker within the hip-hop scene. That's clever but frankly the hook to this song is just terrible...lyrically, melodically, everything. Stick with the singles when listening to Scorpion.
04) "Codeine Cowboy" by 2 Chainz (2011)
Yo Gotti may have been a cowboy for dealing cocaine, but 2 Chainz means to say he's a cowboy that takes codeine on this track from his mixtape of the same name. He at least musters up some references to the Wild West, threatening to shoot us like an outlaw, and women riding him like a horse. You can tell Chaniz's heart's just not in it however. His trademark self-shoutout of "2 Chainz!' is much more mellow than we're used to, and the opening to the track is an almost uninterrupted 30-second cut of Bon Jovi's "Wanted Dead or Alive."
03) "Cowboy" by Kid Rock (1998)
All the indignant cool kids get up and yell at us for letting Kid Rock's lame single get this far up the list. This track certainly hasn't got as much life in it as "Bawidtba" or "I Am The Bull God," but it at least makes sense thematically. Rock isn't playing the Oregon Trail card here, but he's claiming to be heading West (to Los Angeles) from his native Detroit to carry out his Devil Without A Cause lifestyle, like a modern cowboy. Plus he manages to incorporate an upright piano and hollow-body guitar for thematic purposes.
02) "Cowboy" by Tyler, The Creator
Tyler, The Creator avoids Western tropes as well, except when he's delivering the hook, "I'm a cowboy on my own trip." The song deals primarily with the themes of loneliness within fame, so Tyler turns to the classic metaphor of the lonely cowboy. The most famous cowboys in film have travelled alone (or with a Native American companion for racial tension), such as John Wayne's Rooster Cogburn or Clint Eastwood's Blondie, thus the rapper has set himself up as a badass. "On his own trip" could also be a reference to how the straightedge emcee feels around those who imbibe.
01) "Ghetto Cowboy" by Mo Thugs Family
This track—off of the second volume of work from the Bone Thugs brain trust Mo Thugs Family—follows the classic Western narrative song to a "t." If Marty Robbins had grown up in the ghettos of Cleveland instead of Arizona, this is probably the music he would have written. Krayzie Bone takes the lead as a real cowboy heading west to hit up some banks "that ain't been held up yet." He meets up with horse thief Thug Queen, Layzie Bone and Powder P to carry out their outlaw agendas. The story unfolds in hip-hop rhyme with plenty of harmonica (from the accomplished Jimmy Zavala) and equine sound effects to accompany. A fun listen.
We feel bad for trashing Smith's performance 15 years ago, so here's a bonus video of the one good thing that was derived from the track:
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