90’s Nostalgia - my first record purchase (single)

Will 2K by Will Smith (a.k.a 'Big Will' or 'Big Willy Style') was the first single I purchased on my own dime, at the tender age of 13 in the winter of ’99. In essence, this record is a piss-poor cover version of The Clash’s Rock the Casbah, and it only further cemented Smith’s reputation as one of the worst rappers of the 90’s. Of course, at the time, I thought it was unspeakably cool. Smith was at the pinnacle of his 90’s fame following his roles in the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Independence Day, Men in Black, and, dare I mention it, the Wild Wild West, where he had often combined record releases with his output as an actor. I’d recently acquired a hand-me-down hi-fi from my elder sister and I would put the single on in my room, and proceed to gallivant around the house whilst singing along to it.

If any of the preposterous millennium-bug theories had materialised, I would have died happy, singing the chorus ‘it’s here and I like it....’ right before being crushed by a 747 falling out of the sky. With hindsight, the re-release of Prince’s 1999 would have been a marginally better purchase, especially seeing as it needed some sales to beat Will 2K to the top spot in the UK charts. Prince, however, was disgraced in the late 90’s after his changing-himself-into-a-symbol phase and Will Smith was a rising Hollywood action hero who could also rap a bit – there was no difficulty in deciding who was the coolest from the perspective of a 13 year-old boy.

The fact that this record was released to coincide with the dawn of the new millennium (or 'Willenium' as 'Big Will' liked to call it) - making me 13 years of age on purchasing it - probably makes me a late comer to the record-buying experience when compared to my peers. Up until that point, I had relied on the incremental trickle-down of music from my immediate family, and I clearly couldn’t be trusted with money in a record shop when I’d opted for the likes of Will 2K.

If you can, please take the time to remember Will Smith's only truly brilliant couple of minutes as a recording artist with Quincy Jones on production, by clicking here.

This collaboration with Jazzy Jeff is also something of a 90's pop gem amongst Smith's largely dire back catalogue of family-friendly rap tunes.