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Ghost is saying here that he has ruled NYC hip hop every year since he started rapping. The albums referred to here are Only Built 4 Cuban Linx (a Raekwon album in name, but Ghost is featured heavily), The Pretty Toney Album, Ironman, Bulletproof Wallets (it of the extremely gay album cover), and Supreme Clientele

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Ghostface has glittering diamonds to back up his “swagger” (slang for “airs”)

Mick Jagger – lead singer of the Rolling Stones – was quite a swaggalicious fellow in his day..

This brag about his jewelry (“stones”) was borrowed by Kanye on “Swagger Like Us”

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In case you were too wowed by the eagle, check again for the size of the medallion Ghost is wearing. Flavor Flav famously wore a clock around his neck, and Ghost is (rightly) saying that his medallion is the same size

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“10-4” is CB radio jargon, meant to show that you understand what the other person is saying to you.

“Toney Starks” (a play on Tony Stark, the alter ego of the superhero Ironman), is one of Ghost’s nicknames. He has named several of his albums after the character and made a (sadly cut) cameo in the 2008 Iron Man movie

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Ghost has been rapping since the early 1990’s, when Nas was still known as “Nasty Nas”
It’s before Nas dropped the nasty as in illmatic. It came out in 1994, and Ghost has been out since at least 1993.

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Ghostface’s rap is well-delivered like a crafty dart player, but audiences are obsessed with simplistic “one-hit wonders” of rap.

He alludes to D4L’s “Laffy Taffy”, which is named after a sticky candy; hence his usage of the word “stuck.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFlAaATbfz0

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David Koresh, nee Vernon Wayne Howell, was the leader of the Branch Davidian religious sect. The sect’s compound in Waco, Texas was raided and burned to the ground by the FBI in 1993. Koresh died in the fire

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The Tunnel was a popular NYC nightclub in the late 1980’s and 1990’s. Here, Ghost brags about robbing its patrons in his pre-rap days

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Let’s let Ghost himself explain this one:

I heard there was [a James Bond movie] where he was in the octagon [presumably the UFC fighting ring], but I ain’t seen it. I like Bond. He got mad gadgets and makes his shit look live! Niggas be trying to trap him with all kinda ill shit, and he always finds a way to get out!

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One of the all-time great lines. Plays on the dual meaning of sleeping (being ignorant about a situation) and being asleep (/dead but looking as if you’re asleep)

Jay is thus implying that he killed his foe in his sleep and then showed up to the wake just to crack a “hey, he looks just like the last time I saw him!” joke. Of course, Jay is somewhat of a fan of wry funeral humor

Also note the nice contrast between “wake” and “sleeping”

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