Songfacts®:

• While many rappers were singing the praises of "40s," which are 40-ounce bottles of malt liquor, Public Enemy took a stand against them. Group leader Chuck D explained to Melody Maker: "'One Million Bottle Bags' is about the malt liquor problem in black America. Malt liquor has twice as much alcohol content and twice as many residues, that's to say, waste products from regular beer. It's f--ked up beer, with more alcohol. Instead of making people laid back, it makes them hostile. And it leads to a lot of black on black violence in America.
  
  They have massive campaigns for this s--t that are targeted at the black community. Malt liquors are made by the major brewers in this country. When they put their regular beers through the filters, all the excess bulls--t they push to the black community. And it's been killing motherf--kers for the longest period.
  
  Lately one particular brand of malt liquor has been advertised using rappers. And in one commercial (St. Ides, with Ice Cube) they sampled my voice. And a lot of people rang me and asked was I down with it. They thought I'd endorsed it. So I'm suing that company. I wrote 'One Million Bottle Bags' five months prior to any of this legal s--t. But when I found out about the commercial, it was a slap in the face."