Released July 26, 1994 Genre Hip hop, gangsta rap Label Bad Boy Records | Format CD Length 3:38 | |
Recorded 1993; The Hit Factory
(New York City, New York) | ||
"Flava in Ya Ear" is a single by American rapper Craig Mack. The original club mix single was released on 12 inch vinyl in July 1994 on the Bad Boy Entertainment record label, packaged with a series of additional remixes. According to the song's producer Easy Mo Bee, the track was originally intended for Apache, who was unable to record the song due to being on tour with Naughty by Nature and was not sure of future recordings at the time. As a result, Mo Bee gave the instrumental to Mack after Bad Boy founder Sean Combs gave him a substantial amount of money for the instrumental.
The remix of the song features performances by The Notorious B.I.G. (with this being their only collaboration), LL Cool J, Rampage and Busta Rhymes. It also contains Puff Daddy as a promoter and brief appearances by Keisha Spivey. The video features guest appearances by Das EFX, Mic Geronimo, and Irv Gotti, although none perform on the song. The music video was directed by Craig Henry. The song received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Rap Solo Performance at the 37th Grammy Awards in 1995, losing to "U.N.I.T.Y." by Queen Latifah.
The song appeared on Bad Boy's 10th Anniversary... The Hits album. The single itself peaked at number 9 on the Billboard Hot 100. It was certified Platinum by the RIAA & sold 1,000,000 copies in the United States. The remix version of the song appears in the video game Dance Central for the Xbox 360. In addition, the record can be heard in movies such as the semi-autobiographic Notorious, the 2015 biopic Straight Outta Compton, The Wackness and Morris from America.
"Flava in Ya Ear" contains an sample of "We've Only Just Begun" by O'Donel Levy, and was sampled in the Jennifer Lopez and Ja Rule single, "Ain't It Funny (Murder Remix)," as well as the song "Don't Leave Me" from the Backstreet Boys.