Thanks to the early 1990’s West Coast Gangster Rap scene, a lot of people erroneously associate most rappers with the infamous Bloods and Crips gangs (or other gangs). Homeboy Sandman was raised well and doesn’t associate with the self destructiveness of the aforementioned gangs.

However, Rap does have it’s fair share of Bloods and Crips affiliated rappers:

Homeboy Sandman is attacking the popular stereotypes associated with rappers. Just because Sandman raps for a living, doesn’t mean he’s a drug dealer or pothead. That’s not to say that Rap has a shortage of those kinds of rappers:

Ninja Gaiden is a video game series that started in the 1980’s and continues to the present. Based around a Ninja warrior who fights shadowy villains, it first appeared on the Sega Genesis video game console in 1992.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1zWGVArsMk

Genesis also refers to the Book of Genesis from the Hebrew Bible and Christian Old Testament. It’s basically about God creating the world, animals and humans, the very beginning of time. Niles views himself as some sort of powerful being who has been doing his thing since the creation of time, but you could also apply it realistically as him doing his thing since at least the early 1990’s when the first Ninja Gaiden was released for Sega Genesis.

If you to try to confront Homeboy Sandman, it won’t necessarily be a suicidal mission. That still doesn’t mean that you won’t get fucked up. You’ll still be in deep shit trying to mess with Sandman.

Scuba divers wear diving gear and have an oxygen tank that allows them to breathe deep underwater.

To be in “deep shit,” is to be in a troublesome situation where the outcome will most likely not be good for you. Sandman refuses to say the word “shit” though out of respect for children possibly listening to the song. He feels that children have had way too many bad influences, he doesn’t want to be yet another bad influence.

Rakim aka “The R”, is a legendary rapper from Long Island, NY, USA, who emerged in the 1980’s and is credited with advancing lyricism in Rap music. He’s commonly referred to as “Rakim Allah” or “The God”.

YC The Cynic can’t be “The God,” but he can be another powerful entity, Godzilla, a gigantic, fictional reptile monster from Japan.

A man has to always walk around with at least one condom (aka “Jimmy Hat”) on him at all times because you never know if the chick you’re about to bang has crabs, STD’s or worse.

A reference to the 1983 gangster film, Scarface, starring Al Pacino as Tony Montana. In the following scene, Tony meets with a Bolivian cocaine dealer named Alejandro Sosa who questions whether to trust Tony or not. Tony assures him that he’s a man of his word and that he doesn’t break the two things that he has in his life- his balls and his word.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0YMyvM5a8Y

As a Hispanic man of color, Homeboy Sandman, is constantly being harassed by the police. The NYPD’s policy of “Stop and Frisk”, whereby police officers randomly stop and frisk individuals they deem to be “suspicious looking,” has been applied disproportionately to Black and Hispanic men.

Bodega Bamz is from East Harlem, NYC, USA, aka Spanish Harlem aka “El Barrio” (which means “The Neighborhood” in Spanish). It’s known by those names because of it’s large Hispanic population, particularly people of Puerto-Rican descent.