Friday, March 20, 2009

From the Vault: Ghostface Killah - "All That I Got is You" (Feat. Mary J. Blige)

The first time I ever saw this video was in the spring of 1997. At the time, I was 17 years old and I loved two things: rap music and basketball. I was staying at my uncle Rick's house for spring break and his home two very important things: a basketball goal and a television that displayed the wonderful world of BET. My home cable package did not carry BET or even MTV, so, I was stuck with the stepchild of video networks...VH1.

My mind was nearly overwhelmed with all the videos and new music I was taking in. 12 years later, I am still affected by one of the songs I discovered during that exposure to BET..."All That I Got is You". Ghostface Killah sat at that shiny black piano, sang of his impoverished upbringing and changed my life forever. The song instantly reached me and never let go. I walked around with the song playing over and over in my head until a month later when I presented my Side 1 records gift certificate in exchange for the Ghostface album 'Ironman'. I recall getting home, unwrapping the CD and listening to "All That I Got is You" on repeat well into the night. To this day, "All That I Got is You" remains one of my all-time favorite songs and is a lock in my Top 100 songs list.

The video itself illustrates the images described within the lyrics of the song, featuring a young boy who portrays Ghostface in his youth. Born into a family of fifteen, with his mother, grandmother, aunts, uncles and cousins; all living in a three-bedroom apartment. The boy experiences all the hardships depicted in the song: growing up in a poor family in the Stapleton Housing Projects, watching his father leave their family at the age of six, sharing a small bed with three other siblings, picking roaches out of water-filled cereal and going next door to borrow leftover bread from neighbors.

My favorite line:

"Things was deep, my whole youth was sharper than cleats"

No comments: