R. Kelly‘s smash hit “Bump N’ Grind” was made specifically for the Menace II Society soundtrack, but according to Allen Hughes, Jive Records had other plans.
The famed director was a guest on the Rap Radar podcast on a new episode that dropped on Thursday (September 14). While discussing the 1993 classic he co-directed with his brother Albert, Hughes explained how “Bump ‘N Grind” became the song that got away.
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“Me and my brother both were EPs on the soundtrack, but everything starts with music for me. So A&R’d the whole album or whatever,” he began. “I remember the thing that hurt me the most – and I’m gonna air him out right now – was Jive Records’ Barry Weiss. This is before R. Kelly was really big. He only had one album out, and we made a deal that he was gonna give us an original track for the soundtrack.”
He continued: “So I flew to Chicago because R. Kelly and I [shared an attorney]. Gave him the Menace VHS tape and the next day I came back and he had a song for me that he wrote to Menace. And I listened to the song, I go, ‘Oh shit!’ That’s how involved I was in the soundtrack. I called Barry and I said, ‘I just heard R. Kelly’s first No. 1 single.'”
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“And he goes, ‘Oh shit, I can’t wait to hear it!’ A week later he calls me and goes, ‘I got good news and bad news. The good news is you’re right, this is going to be his first No. 1 record. The bad news is it’s not going on the soundtrack.’ It was ‘Bump ‘N Grind.’
“If you hear what he’s saying at the opening of the song, he’s talking about Caine. ‘My mind’s tellin’ me no, but my body’s tellin’ me yes‘ – he’s talking about Caine because of Jada [Pinkett-Smith]’s character Ronnie and Pernell. That’s what it’s about.”
You can view the full interview below:
https://youtu.be/IqOCZtZKuW0?si=h2CSBL0vfXZZ1d6j&t=2500
Earlier this year, Allen Hughes revealed that the late Eazy-E was supposed to play O-Dog in Menace II Society, but his attempts to “control” the movie resulted in him being dropped.
Hughes stopped by The Breakfast Club in April, where he spoke about his admiration for Eazy and how the role was originally written for the late N.W.A. legend.
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Due to Eazy and his manager/business partner Jerry Heller’s insatiable desire to dictate the script, however, Hughes was forced to cut ties with the rapper, ultimately casting Larenz Tate as the hell-raising O-Dog.
The director said that the experience opened his eyes to what it was like working with Eazy and Heller and made him understand why Dr. Dre and Ice Cube left N.W.A.
“We wrote that role for Eazy-E,” Hughes said of O-Dog’s character. “Eazy-E was my first real O.G. mentor in the business, right [around] the summer when Dre left [N.W.A] in ’91. That’s a long story.
“I learned everything from Eazy, but one of the things with him and Jerry [Heller] is they always try to keep you in a box and control you. And they were trying to control us in the script and I just had to move on, and it was for peanuts.”
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He continued: “I adore Eazy. He was so giving and so down-to-earth. By the way, great with his fans, too. Very patient with his fans. But I see why Cube left, I see why Dre left. There was a whole thing there.”
