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They want EFX, some live EFX
They want EFX, some live EFX
They want EFX, some live EFX
Snap a neck for some live EFX Das EFX – They Want EFX
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Two samples are used for this hook, from “Breath Control II” by Boogie Down Productions and “Underground” by E.P.M.D. respectively

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=011sFLm9eY0#t=87s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGWhAXnE49Q

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So Peter Piper, I'm hyper than Pinocchio's nose Das EFX – They Want EFX
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This references a very well-known tongue twister from Mother Goose:

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers;
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked;
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
Where’s the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?

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But I can fe-fi or fo, diddly-bum, here I come Das EFX – They Want EFX
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Reference to Jack and the Beanstalk, and specifically the refrain spoken by the Giant in the story:

Fee-fi-fo-fum/
I smell the blood of an Englishman/
Be he alive, or be he dead/
I’ll grind his bones to make my bread/

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People try to snatch the credit, but can't claim the card
Showin' out in videos, sayin' they costarred (Ayo) De La Soul – Stakes Is High
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Fraud is fraud. Also if you are reading this and under the age of 15, recognize that “showing out in a video” is making a cameo in a now extinct form of artistic expression referred as a “music video.” In rap videos of the time, it was popular for a rapper’s friends, family, posse, or any other hanger-on to appear somewhere, either chillin' in the background or hyping their boy frantically in the foreground. De La was sick of this artificial grab at fame that was polluting and diluting the rap industry.

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Default_avatar_100

56

6 years

I would also add that Dave might be talking about personal responsibility and accountability; which is obvs the running theme of this track (and being real, wether in rap or IRL). Rappers/people want the excesses of life without the responsibility/consequences that come with it.

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Default_avatar_100

2,147

9 years

This could easily be interpreted as a shot at Puff Daddy who always appeared in the videos of the artists he had signed.

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Crunch a nigga like a Nestle, you know my steez GZA (Ft. Method Man) – Shadowboxin'
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Steez = style. The phrase “you know my steez” was later sampled for a hook by DJ Premier on a track of the same title from Gang Starr’s 1998 album Moment of Truth.

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Marked this as restating the line?
5 years
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Reggie
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5 years

Crunch a nigga like a Nestle is wordplay from the candy bar “Nestle Crunch”.

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Niggas gunnin', my third eye seen it comin' before it happened GZA (Ft. Method Man) – Shadowboxin'
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In Five Percenter teachings, the third eye refers to the mind, denoted by the letter C in the Supreme Alphabet.

Meth suggests that he possesses an instinctual spidey-sense that allows him to anticipate threats.

He also referred to his third eye on “Stimulation”, which featured on his 1994 debut studio Tical:

Through the love of my 3rd eye got me thinking

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Special technique- (Nigga, fuck that)
Spe-special technique of shadowboxin' GZA (Ft. Method Man) – Shadowboxin'
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The sampled dialogue is from the the 1983 Kung Fu film Shaolin vs. Lama. RZA uses the same sample to introduce Raekwon’s “Guillotine (Swordz)”.

About the film, RZA told Vanity Fair,

I’ll never forget being in the movie theater when the shadow boxing technique came out. Man, the whole audience just started screaming. Wow.

It can be heard below:

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7 years

The Vocals you hear are from The Shaolin Temple, starring Jet Li (1982)

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The cop knocked on my window and said, "Boy, where's the fire?" Beastie Boys – High Plains Drifter
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“Where’s the fire?” is a sarcastic comment said to a person who is/was driving too fast. In other words, “Surely the reason you’re driving so fast is because there’s an emergency, like you’re rushing to put out a fire somewhere perhaps?”

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It tickles to see you try to be like Mr. Pickles OutKast – ATLiens
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Here, Big Boi could be alluding to the father in the children’s cartoon series, Rugrats, Stu Pickles, who invented children’s toys. Therefore, Big Boi laughs at the idea that someone as unoriginal as ‘you’ is trying to invent new things.

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Then I heard it's not what you make but how much you spent OutKast – ATLiens
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The saying “it’s not how much you make, it’s how much you save” refers to how a person’s net worth is calculated by factoring in how much money they bring in, but also how much they spent. Making a lot of money doesn’t mean anything when you waste it all on foolish things, like the other rappers that Big Boi sees around him are doing.

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Marked this as a stretch?
4 years

Molly Ireland’s interpretation seems to be more on point

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77a98b67b6c8131d8aa3bb9970194256

3,798

5 years

Or he could simply be referring to those who spend their money on expensive things just to show how much they have instead of actually making and having a good amount of money.

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Molly Ireland
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5 years

From the tone of voice, I think this is less a reiteration of sound financial advice (to save money) and more a comment on the pressure they feel to move up in the world by living in more expensive parts of town than they grew up in or spending more money to advertise their success after the first album. That interpretation fits better with their money and class-related anxieties expressed later in the song (“now I’m sitting at the end of the month I just made it”) and elsewhere on the album (“True, I’ve got more fans than the average man, but not enough loot to last me /
To the end of the week, I live by the beat, like you live check-to-check /
If you don’t move your feet then I don’t eat, so we like neck-to-neck,” Elevators).

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