Ice Cube Responds to Interpretations of “Straight Outta Compton”

In honor of his new film “Straight Outta Compton,” Ice Cube decided to check out some fan interpretations of his lyrics and see if they really get him or not.

“Right now I’m going to go through the lyrics of my song with NWA called ‘Straight Outta Compton,’ and I got some interpretations from fans on Rap Genius on what my lyrics mean,” he said in this video with Vanity Fair.

For the lyric “When I’m called off / I got a sawed-off / squeeze the trigger and bodies are hauled off,” SameOldShawn gets it pretty close with his interpretation: “Ice Cube is not shy about using a sawed-off shotgun to kill people when necessary. The shotgun also appears to be a metaphor for knowledge.”

But for “N***** start to mumble / they wanna rumble / mix ‘em and cook ‘em in a pot like gumbo,” another fan makes a bit of a stretch: “Cube’s gumbo recipe substitutes the flesh of his enemies for the andouille sausage.”

“Kind of, but not really,” Ice Cube says. “This is more a threat about taking my enemies and actually cooking’ they ass inside of my gumbo. No substitutes, just sucker MCs in the gumbo.”