Blak Majik

Album: Nobody Smiling (2014)
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Songfacts®:

  • This hard-edged track finds Common boasting about his lyrical skills and saluting his Chicago hometown over No I.D's beat. The rapper also namechecks Neo-Soul songstress Erykah Badu, who he dated in the early 2000's ("Ni--as seen Badu's ass and said 'I seen what you was on'").
  • That's Jhené Aiko singing the hook, bridge and third verse. "I wanted to team up with [Jhené] and do a song that was fresh. I called it 'Blak Majik' because I say we make something out of nothing," Common told Rap-Up.com. "It's also a feel-good, fun song, but it's hard, it's rough."

    "Jhené Aiko is an artist that I truly respect," he continued. "I think she has a unique voice in music, in culture. When I say unique voice, not only is it her singing voice, but her perspective, who she is, what she offers to the world is something that's very, very special. It's a soul to it. It's a spirit to it."
  • The nonsense lines that Aiko croons in the bridge are a couple from her verse, flipped and reordered in order to emphasize her magical powers: "I am not here I exist in between. I am the conscious you have in your dream."

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