Star Wars originally hit the big screen just as Hip-Hop was finding its feet so it’s only natural that the pop culture phenomenon had an influence on those who were also finding their creative feet at around the same time. A science fiction/fantasy movie franchise that broke through the barriers and becomes adored by more than you’re average Pac-man playing, comic book reading, front of the class sitting, Dr Who watching sci-fi fan. The parallels between the themes touched on in the movies and in real life are very close politically and socially so it’s no surprise that some of the gifted lyricists out there picked up on this also. Here are a handful of examples of MC’s that used the Force in their rhymes.
“Star Wars I’m Han Solo with three egos/ and three charges, I got to see three P.O.’s” – Method Man (Notorious B.I.G. – “Rap Phenomenon”)
The Wu-Tang general popped up on the posthumous Biggie release Born Again on the DJ Premier produced & Redman assisted “Rap Phenomenon”, easily one of the more organic sounding tracks on the compilation styled release. Meth comes out with the effortless wordplay, for those not hip to the reference Han Solo is a semi-major character in the original trilogy and C-3PO is the name of the lovable and bashful droid (robot) that made appearances in all 8 of the major films to date. The play on each word is pretty self-explanatory with this information in mind.
“She ain’t know, that innocent shit with Obi-Wan behind a Jedi back can turn Annakin to Vader/ Your lack of faith in the Force is disturbin” – Jay Electronica (“Annakin’s Prayer”)
“You don’t control this, you barely hold this/ screamin’ brand new when they just sanitize the old shit/ suppose it’s just another clever Jedi mind trick/ that they been runnin’ across stars through all the time with” – Mos Def (Black Star – “Thieves In The Night”)
Q-Tip sets off this joint from the Rhyme & Reason Original Soundtrack and kicks a very simple yet surprisingly accurate reference to the Jedi Knights. As Yoda once said during Luke Skywalker’s Jedi training “A Jedi uses the Force for knowledge and defense, never for attack” the fact the Q actually said counter-attack shows that he was paying attention to the wise one during The Empire Strikes Back.
“Gave me the green light like Yoda knife/ So I’ma force my will like the Force I wield” – Lupe Fiasco (“Failure”)
While it is technically called a light sabre as everyone knows, we’ll accept knife in this case because Lupe actually knew which color Yoda used. Lupe is also using the line to demonstrate just how easy he can force his will with no protest like a Jedi mind trick. Deliberate or not he also uses what pop culture has dubbed as ‘Yodaspeak’ in which the sentence structure is inverted in this case the verb is put after the noun. Without getting too nerdy this is either an amazing coincidental mistake or Lupe intricately put that Easter egg in for the Star Wars fans to make up for the naming error of the Jedi weapon just before it.
Honorable mention to Skratch Bastid. The Canadian DJ dropped one of the most talked about turntablism routines of all time as he scratched and manipulated Buck 65’s “The Centaur” and turned it into the Imperial March theme (one of the most famous musical pieces in the Star Wars movies) at Scribble Jam in 2001, although he didn’t win that year the video has amassed over 3 million views on YouTube. A unique and jaw-dropping ode indeed.
