Written By: Julian Enghauser
While I could never choose which style of old-school hip-hop I love with all of my heart more, East or West Coast, I do find myself gravitating toward the feel of the West. While the West does tell gritty stories of an impoverished society at war with itself and many outside factors, just like the faces of the East Coast, there is an aesthetic of its palm trees and beaches that wins over my ears. The West Coast becomes a kind of beachfront backdrop that shines upon a pack of glossy lowriders. The cultural atmosphere of Los Angeles, mixed with cultures being starved of success, blends an audio taste of human duality. Beautiful yet gritty – saddening yet proud. Juggling this humanistic duality so expertly is Ice Cube – not only because he provides a lighter side to the street perspective like he debuted on the film Friday, he once again does so with two songs, You Know How We Do It and Today Was A Good Day.
You Know How We Do It is the embodiment of what a West Coast sunset looks like in musical form, cruising down a street only seconds from the beach. It retains its street knowledge and grit of living within a corner of the “social unknown”, while hypnotically relaxing itself within its sun-kissed boom-bapping tunes of coolness.
Today Was A Good Day is a success story, even though its circumstances remain temporary. Such a song leans deeper into living a slice of life, uncertain of survival, yet only now, is everything at peace. The song is a celebration of the moment, with the stars of society aligning on this song’s particular day, allowing for bliss and no violence.
Both songs match the aesthetic of a casual beachside drive, lit by the setting Sun, or by a warm, windy night passing through one’s face as they observe the city lights from up top LA’s mountainous regions. These songs are stylistically relaxing odes of straight coolness and cultural style. Ice Cube beautifully creates two (of many) iconic West Coast anthems within the hip-hop scene. Both retain an edge while inviting a sense of peace within. Such songs, I believe, felt related to each other through their chilled atmosphere of instrumental funkiness. This double feature of hip-hop songs remains a classic, and I would hope to see that as time goes on, this kind of musical title never changes.
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