“Ice Ice Baby” is a way better song, for example, if you’re unaware that it samples the absolute bejesus out of the 1981 Queen and David Bowie arena-rock masterpiece “Under Pressure”; it’s a better song if you’ve never seen that exquisitely mortifying MTV clip of Vanilla Ice attempting to explain that “Ice Ice Baby” doesn’t sample “Under Pressure.” It’s better if you’re unaware that the lines, “Police on the scene / You know what I mean / They pass me up / Confronted all the dope fiends,” is the purest expression of white privilege in the history of American song.
