"Give it up for my shorty..."

“I Reminisce about My Ghetto Princess Everyday…”
written by K. Billy

Love…it’s trials and it’s tribulations have been at the center of my life as of late. You may know what it feels like, but unless you’re in it, IN it, the true significance escapes you; the affect that a person, singular, can have on your psyche. Expressing this in normal conversation is difficult enough; The Lost Boys had their own way.

21 words said it all: “A ghetto love is the law that we live by/day by day I wonder why my shorty had to die…” It’s clear from those first bars, there was a quality about this song that brought it closer to you. Like Meth and Mary’s tribute to Marvin and Tammi on “You’re All I Need,” “Renee” makes an impact on the heart. Mr. Cheeks, an underrated writer, expertly weaves a visual tapestry with his words, making real for us the love he felt for his “ghetto princess.” You could almost be walking behind him, watching his fateful meeting with Renee taking place as he leaves John Jay College. The conversation begins and they connect over their differences in smoking techniques. Classic.

This song was made in the murky era of mid-1990’s hip-hop when the genre was making it’s transition ever more slowly into the more materialistic and superficial commercial product we see today. But, the boys from South Jamaica, Queens retain the lyricism of their predecessors and craft a joint that is at the same time real and surreal. I can only hope very few of you readers have experienced the loss of love, let alone the lost life of a love. Whether Mr. Cheeks is talking about himself or building a story from scratch, all I can think about is: “Ayo, I never been in love/but every time I’m burstin' in and out of state it’s shorty that I’m thinkin’ of…”
You’d be a little hard pressed to find a song recently that displays this kind of simple declaration of a man’s love for a woman. Similes and metaphors are nice, but sometimes, you just want someone to say it, no confusion, and no room for misinterpretation. Even if they forego the “Lupe Fiasco” approach, the content rarely gets more intimate than describing the different positions and places they’ve blessed. Again, cool, but not all the time. The album this song was featured on happened to be a good one, with “Jeeps, Lex Coupe, Bimaz and Benz” and “Music Makes Me High” being the other highlights on it, so “Renee” only helped to bolster its reputation. Still, it remains one song I can play if I need to remind myself how it feels to love a woman…

**A.M., this was for you. Thank you.