Recorded 2004 Length 3:28 | Genre Hip hop, R&B | |
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Released July 5, 2005 (2005-07-05) Format CD single, digital download | ||
"Gold Digger" is a song recorded by American rapper Kanye West featuring guest vocals by Jamie Foxx. Released as the second single from West's second album, Late Registration (2005), "Gold Digger" peaked at number one on the US Billboard Hot 100 on September 6, 2005, becoming West's and Foxx's second number one single. Co-produced with Jon Brion, the song contains samples of Ray Charles' "I Got a Woman".
Contents
- Background
- Music and lyrics
- Music video
- Chart performance
- Cover versions and remixes
- In the media
- Personnel
- References
The single broke a record for the most digital downloads in a week, selling over 80,000, and was also the fastest-selling digital download of all time; both records have since been broken. It was 2005's second-longest running number one on the Billboard Hot 100 at ten weeks, behind "We Belong Together" by Mariah Carey. At the 2006 Grammy Awards, "Gold Digger" was nominated for Record of the Year and won the award for Best Rap Solo Performance. The song lists at number 60 on Billboard magazine's All Time Top 100 and at number 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 Songs of the Decade. "Gold Digger" was voted number 20 on VH1's 100 Greatest Songs of Hip Hop. As of January 2011, the song has sold over 3,000,000 copies in the United States.
Background
Upon its release, many surmised that West conceived "Gold Digger" after watching Jamie Foxx's Oscar-winning portrayal of Ray Charles in the biographical film Ray. However, he had actually constructed the beat of the song long before the movie was even developed. West originally produced and recorded "Gold Digger" in Ludacris's home in Atlanta for Shawnna's 2004 debut album Worth Tha Weight and had written the chorus from a female first-person viewpoint: "I'm not sayin' I'm a gold digger, but I ain't messin' with no broke niggas." However, for reasons unknown, Shawnna passed on using the song. Not wanting to let it go to waste, West decided to keep the beat for himself and add lyrics expressed from a male's point-of-view.
The second verse of "Gold Digger" was the first to be written, as West used to rap the verse in early 2004 while on tour promoting his debut album, The College Dropout. The first verse was made later in the year while West was on Usher's Evolution Tour. Lastly, the original third verse was taken from an unreleased song called "Drop Dead Gorgeous," which West had produced and rapped on for Murphy Lee of St. Lunatics. About a year later, right before "Gold Digger" was set to be released as a single, West decided to write a different third verse and in a week the new song was recorded and mastered at Sony Music Studios in New York City.
The idea of employing Jamie Foxx specifically to sing an interpolation of Ray Charles' "I Got a Woman" in place of its initial sample did in fact arise from West seeing Ray with his friend John Mayer. Foxx's vocals were recorded over many takes; in one version he sang from start to finish, but the track was retracted as his performance didn't coincide well with the song's instrumentation. After recording another version, Foxx decided to re-record it once more as he felt it contained too many explicit lyrics. Once the track was finally in place, it was layered with additional instruments provided by American film score composer Jon Brion and individually selected by West. By the end of their very first studio session together, the pair had completed the basic tracks for the final version of "Gold Digger". Despite being a featured singer, Foxx's part only appears in the intro and the rest of the song uses West's vocals and samples of Charles.
Music and lyrics
"Gold Digger" contains samples (as well as an interpolation during the introduction) of "I Got a Woman" by Ray Charles, and a bouncy beat formed from handclaps and scratches by DJ A-Trak. Towards the end, the song employs vintage 1970s synthesizers which emit a honking sound in cadence to Kanye's voice. West delivers a tongue-in-cheek lyrical narrative within "Gold Digger" in which he critically depicts the disastrous life of a man married to a woman who manipulates him for financial gain. However, another story arises within the third verse, which illustrates a once destitute black male who earns a fortune and decides to leave a loyal, unselfish girlfriend for a white girl.
Music video
The song's music video was directed by Hype Williams, who also directed West's previous video, "Diamonds from Sierra Leone". Shot in a widescreen letterbox format, using stylized art direction with few props, the video features performances shots of West interspersed with footage of Williams' trademark female video models depicted as "pin-up" cover models from fictional vintage magazines. The titles of the magazines on whose covers the women appear reflect the correlating verses in the song. Foxx is also present, lip-synching both his own parts and the Ray Charles vocal sample. John Legend makes a brief cameo. At the 2006 MTV Video Music Awards, "Gold Digger" received nominations for both Best Male Video and Best Hip Hop Video, but did not win either of these awards.
Chart performance
Following the chart performance of "Diamonds from Sierra Leone", which failed to crack the Top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100, West's label became concerned with how a follow up single would perform. Their concerns were unfounded as "Gold Digger" became a success, hitting number one on the Billboard Hot 100, Pop 100, Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks and the Hot Rap Tracks charts.
When Late Registration was released, the album version of "Gold Digger" was first made available for download. Approximately 80,000 digital downloads of "Gold Digger" were sold through legal music services such as iTunes and Napster in that first week, making it the most successful digital sales debut ever. The song broke the record for the most digital downloads sold in one week, and the record for the fastest selling digital single of all time, both previously held by Gwen Stefani's "Hollaback Girl". "Gold Digger" sold over 1,000,000 downloads during its seven weeks of release. This makes "Gold Digger" one of the first songs in history to sell over 1,000,000 downloads in the United States. "Gold Digger" was certified as 5 times platinum on April 10, 2014.
The high digital download sales helped propel the song from number 19 to number one in one week, the fifth highest jump ever to that position on the Hot 100. The jump ended the 14-week (and 10 consecutive week) run of Mariah Carey's "We Belong Together" at number one, and kept Carey's "Shake It Off" from replacing "We Belong Together" as the number one single. The song spent 10 weeks at the top of the Hot 100 until rising R&B star Chris Brown's hit "Run It!" shot up to the pole position for the week of November 19.
"Gold Digger" also became West's first Top 10 single on the Mainstream Top 40 chart, peaking at number two. On the Pop 100, "Gold Digger" also broke a record by jumping from number 94 to number two, giving West the record for the biggest ever jump on that chart.
In MAX music TV's top 1000 songs of all time, 'Gold Digger' was number 462 on the list.
By reaching number one, "Gold Digger" gave Charles his first Hot 100 chart-topper as a songwriter, credited as a result of the "I Got a Woman" sample. As an artist, Charles topped the Hot 100 three times in the 1960s, but always with other writers' songs.
As of May 2011, the song has sold 3,083,000 copies in the US. On April 10, 2014, "Gold Digger" was certified as 5 times platinum.
"Gold Digger" is Kanye West's second highest charting single in the UK, only behind his number one single "Stronger". It was only held off the top spot by The Pussycat Dolls' "Don't Cha". It is by far West's longest charting single in the UK having amassed an impressive 48 weeks inside the top 100 songs. 295,000 copies of "Gold Digger" have been sold in the UK as stated by the Official UK Charts Company.
Cover versions and remixes
In the media
Personnel
Information taken from Late Registration liner notes.