- What up y'all Young MA here and
these are my top five favorite songs
that's in some type of relation to my life.
My first favorite song would be
50 Cent, What Up Gangsta from the
Get Rich or Die Trying album.
That was like the first album I ever bought
and that song was just so fire
and I remember my grandmother had a camcorder
and we used to use the camcorder to shoot
fake movies or music videos.
We had the wall unit we would put the camera there
and then me and my cousins would make
a music video right in front of it
and I'll have my little hoodie on and
I'll be like what up, what up gangsta.
So that was in relation to when I was young, turning up.
I wanted to be a rapper so 50 Cent
definitely influenced me.
I'ma say No Ordinary Love because
that song there's so many rhythms throughout the song
it's like she, it just soothes you,
you know what I mean her voice just soothes you.
♪ This is no ordinary love ♪
♪ No ordinary love ♪
♪ This is no ordinary love ♪
I actually got influenced by Sade
from grandfather, rest in peace, he will always
played her in the house and when I was a kid,
I ain't gonna lie I used to be like,
this is boring I didn't understand it,
you know what I mean, I didn't understand it,
I was a kid and my grandfather used to love her,
like he would just walk around the house singing her,
you know have her on while he's cleaning up,
I think that's where my mother got it from.
As I got older I understood why,
you know what I mean and till this day
I can listen to Sade at least once a day.
See I'm taking it to Reggae now,
there's this one song I used to listen to
a lot as a kid it's called Going Away
by Beenie Man & Sanchez,
I had to be like nine, eight years old.
I just always remember my mom playing it
when she would clean up in the house
or we'll be on the road headed to another state
or something like that I always tell her
Ma can you put on (humming) ya know,
I'll sing the lyrics or whatever but
I never know the name of it I just sing a lyric
and I just remember being in the backseat
and sometimes there be times that song will
put me to sleep, not in a bad way but
that was like how I was able to just vibe.
I hear the song she'll play it back to back,
I'll be like Ma play it again, play it again,
so I didn't understand what they was saying,
just the sound, the rhythm, the vibe, everything about it.
I like Jay-Z Hard Knock Life,
taking it way back it just gives me
a feel of like how New York City,
just the heart of Brooklyn used to be
and like when you watch the video you just see
the culture of kids in the park
and sprinklers is on and kids is actually
outside on their bikes and the song itself
from the Annie movie just brought a different sound
into hip hop to mix samples in with hard hip hop,
you know speaking from the street.
Every time I hear that song it just
gives me a different vibe and definitely
influenced my music as well.
Last but not least Young MA Walk,
as you can see like I'm wearing the hat
and the hoodie, that's kind of when I came back
in the scene and people was wonderin',
yo MA, where you been, where you been at?
The story behind Walk and why it's
influential in my life is because
I actually recorded the song myself.
I built a studio in my house for the first time,
I never built a studio, never knew nothing
about a studio, finally put everything together
and really sat there and recorded myself
and put the song out and it did good,
because it's like over 20 some million on YouTube.
I shot the video in the same place
where I actually recorded it and
throughout the whole video it's
just going back and forth in the basement part of my house.
Walk is basically and metaphorically speaking
to just be chill not really getting
out of character not being to aggressive
just feeling like you're comfortable
in your space and you just walking on the beach.
It's like some New Yorkers say too,
like you walked on that or something like that.
Now since then I've been like,
I record my own stuff in my studio.
Yeah I thought I needed an engineer,
and I was like I don't need no engineer.
I got it.