Outkast - Ms. Jackson

"It happened for a reason, one can't be mad.'"

Album: Stankonia [4th album]
Recorded: Atlanta, Georgia
Genre: Hip Hop
Album Release: October 31st 2000
Single Release: October 24th 2000 [2nd single]
Length: 4:30
Producer: Earthtone III
Vocalist: Andre [age 25], Big Boi [age 25]
Label: Arista Records, LaFace Records

Music Video


Live in 2000


Live at World AIDS Day 2000

Charts, Streams & Sales

Australia (singles): #2 [x5 platinum]

France (singles): #5 
Germany (singles): #1 [x3 gold]
Holland (singles): #1
Sweden (singles): #1 
UK (singles): #2 [x3 platinum]
USA (singles): #1 [x3 platinum]
Spotify: 1,196,000,000 +
YouTube Music: 740,000,000 +
BET Awards 2001 Winner: Best Music Video
MTV Video Music Awards 2001 Winner: Best Music Video 

Credits

Bass, conga, drums, guitar, piano

Details

• Outkast had become musically ambitious with their previous album Aquemini (1998) and Stankonia continued this development into a sound that went beyond hip hop. Like their previous release, it incorporated elements of funk, gospel, and soul but Stankonia was more energetic, idiosyncratic and had more commercial appeal. The album had even more influences than Aquemini did and, for me, this is the point when the overall feel strayed too far away from the core genre.
  
  The amount of raw hip hop on Stankonia was greatly reduced to create radio-friendly, bubblegum efforts full of brightly coloured music videos and was enjoyed by people far removed from the typical rap audience. Stankonia was played by teenage girls in their pink, sequin-decorated bedrooms, but when it worked, it worked. It was still Outkast. Andre and Big Boi were still effortless rappers with unique flows and their own inimitable sense of style. 'Ms. Jackson' is one of the groups most popular songs and also one of their best.
  
  Resonating with listeners because it came from the heart, Andre first wrote his lyrics on an acoustic guitar. The Ms. Jackson in question is the mother of the respected soul singer Erykah Badu, who had gave birth to Andre's child in 1997. Badu has said that the titular 'Ms. Jackson' loved the song and even purchased a license plate with Ms. Jackson on it, just like the one in the music video, despite her real name being Ms. Wright. 
  
  Andre's lyrics detail how he didn't really understand love when he was young, challenging his elders: 'you say it's puppy love we say it's full grown.' Deeper in his verse, he makes it clear his earlier position was naive by saying 'I hope we feel like this forever, forever ever, forever ever', like a fairy tale recited by children.
  
  When the relationship inevitably ends badly he apologises to Ms. Jackson for making her daughter cry in a way that's heartfelt, infectious and perfect for radio. Big Boi's verses are more aggressive and feature his anger at the way his baby momma and his baby momma's momma treat him.
  
  
• 'Ms. Jackson' topped the US charts in the year 2000, achieving significant airplay in major markets such as New York and L.A. However, this success didn't happen overnight. In 1995, when the group won best newcomer at the Source Awards, the audience booed loudly as hip hop from the south wasn't credible in the eyes of wider America.
  
  Just five short years later, Outkast would top the US charts and become household names, not only in their native Southern states, but all over the world. In another ten years the Southern style of hip hop known as trap music would dominate the genre more generally, seeing rappers from the coasts  imitating the same flows they were mocking years before.
  
  Outkast, and their contemporaries such as Scarface, Ludacris, UGK and Three 6 Mafia, helped to bring Southern hip hop to prominence, with it came a rise in 808 drums and sub bass, as well as a change in lyrical content, flow, slang and song structure that saw hip hop change its typical snares on 2 and 4 drum pattern, into snares on 1 and 3, which might seem like a small difference but dramatically changes the feel of the music.
  
  
• Stankonia is represented by Andre as a kind of Shangri-La, a place where you are freely express yourself. Outkast gradually came into their image and themselves during their time in the music industry. Their first album was released when they were only teenagers, so it's obvious that they still weren't fully developed as human beings, yet alone artists.
  
  The image they portrayed in their earlier years is vastly different to the kaleidoscopic, idiosyncratic one they popularised later in their career, but really it was a case of them feeling more confident in their own work. The record labels trust in them grew with the success of each release and Outkast were granted a license to experiment from hardcore fans. They had proven what they were capable of on earlier releases and when it came to Stankonia, upped the ante considerably.
  
  Andre and Big Boi didn't listen to hip hop while making the record, and during recording Andre became more interested in singing than rapping, an artistic choice he would carry forward into later work and ultimately led to the dissolution of the group.
  
  

Artwork