[Verse 1]
I was a two-year-old toddler
Still sucking on my bottle
When my parents got divorced
Which was the pits like avocados
Pops hopped in his auto
And he drove off full throttle
Only child, single mom
Not many male role models
Not a lot of father figures
Once my Pop Duke split
So I had to swap him out
And adopt a new pick
And my surrogate pops was hip-hop music
So now I don't call it 'rap', I call it 'pop music'

[Chorus]
Rap music was the father figure that raised me
So I say 'pop music' because I feel as if I'm its son
My uncle Alan set it off when he gave me
Two cassettes as Hanukkah gifts in 1991

[Verse 2]
Now one of those tapes was by Naughty by Nature
It's their self-titled debut album, "Naughty by Nature"
And there's a song on there called "Ghetto Bastard"
About the absent father of Treach, their lead rapper
Where he says, "I was one who never had and always mad
Never knew my dad
Motherfuck the fag"
And using the word fag is not my bag, no
But dag, yo that sentiment was powerful and aggro
Treach also felt lost and alone
But unlike me, he was filled with testosterone
Like Sylvester Stallone
And from then on, class was in session
I was basking in masculine rap lessons
From men like Method Man and Redman
And Beenie Man and Birdman
R.A. the Rugged Man, La the Darkman
And the Sunz of Man and Paul Barman
And father figures like Big Poppa and Puff Daddy
And Snoop the Doggfather and Kane the Big Daddy
Not crisscross exactly
Daddy Mac and Mac Daddy
But Father MC and Trick Daddy
I learned about male bonding from the Wu-Tang Killa Bees
Eminem taught me craftsmanship and productivity
LL showed me how to be smooth with the ladies
And I learned Jews could be dope emcees from the Beasties
And I got exposed to anger, violence, and misogyny
'Cause your pops doesn't only impact you positively
But most importantly, I learned I wanted to be an emcee
The rap apple didn't fall far from the tree
The rapple!
[Chorus]
I never had a daddy rocking my cradle
I just had pop music to rock the stage and the microphone
Pop music raised me up like I was the roof
Not a boy from the hood but these men from the hood
Brought me up from boyhood into manhood

[Verse 3]
So, here's the epilogue, I was a college kid in Boston
And my friend at Tufts called me up when class started that Autumn
And she said there was a concert at her school for welcome back
And Naughty by Nature was the headlining act
So I go to the show, and two thirds of the way through
Treach says, "Here's the deal, y'all, every concert we do
We like to showcase local talent, so come on Tufts
You know who your best emcees are
Send 'em on up"
The next thing I know I'm waiting on stage in a lineup
I stood there in a panic, queued the best line in my mind up
'Til Kay Gee, their DJ, looked at me and pointed
And he dropped the instrumental
And I totally destroyed it
Treach said "You blew up the place!"
And put his arm around me
In what I can only describe as a fatherly embrace
And I felt the joy that can't be expressed as Treach pressed
My Old Navy t-shirt against his bulletproof vest