Songfacts®:

• The song was meant to be a contrast to the other songs on Ice Cube's album, The Predator, which was recorded in the wake of the LA Riots of 1992. According to Cube, "The inspiration was my life at the time... I was at the top of the rap game. It was the summer of '92 and I was in a hotel room, really in a state of euphoria. I had all the money I had dreamed of. I was in a good frame of mind. And I remember thinking, 'Okay, there's been the riots, people know I will deal with that. That's a given. But I rap all this gangsta stuff – what about all the good days I had?"
• The song's music video is the first half of a two-part series. It is the prelude to the video for "Check Yo Self," which depicts Ice Cube being arrested in front of his home and being sent to prison.
• The song is exactly 4:20 in length, an allusion to the song's depiction of hedonistic activity (specifically, marijuana use). >>

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  Fujiko - Lexington, KY for above 3
• The slinky groove on this song is sampled from an Isley Brothers tune called "Footsteps in the Dark."
• Ice Cube ends this song on a negative note, ordering his DJ to stop the record and declaring, "Stop this s--t! What the f--k I'm thinking about." Turns out the good day may have been imaginary.
• This was Ice Cube's most popular song, getting lots of spins on Urban radio stations and some play on Top 40 stations with bold program directors. Of course, the version used on the radio was heavily edited, but there was little mistaking what he meant by "my Jimmy runs deep."
  
  It was Ice Cube's highest Hot 100 chart placing, and an especially lucrative one since he wrote the song entirely by himself (credited to his real name: O'Shea Jackson). Many of his other chart entries are collaborations, including his recording with the female rapper Yo-Yo on "You Can't Play With My Yo-Yo" (#36, 1991) and "Check Yo Self," which he recorded with Das EFX (#20, 1993).