O.P.P. (song)

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"O.P.P."
Single by Naughty by Nature
from the album Naughty By Nature
Released	September 24, 1991 (CD)
Format	CD, cassette, 12"
Genre	Hip Hop
Length	4:31
Label	Tommy Boy Records
Writer(s)	Vincent Brown/Anthony Criss/Keir Gist/Berry Gordy, Jr.
Producer(s)	Naughty By Nature
Chart positions
#6 #35
Naughty by Nature singles chronology
–	"O.P.P." (1991)	"Everything's Gonna Be Alright" (1992)

"O.P.P." is a 1991 song recorded by rap group Naughty By Nature. Boasting a catchy chorus, the song soared into the US Top Ten, propelling their debut album to platinum status. The song's declaration "Down Wit' OPP" was a popular catchphrase in the U.S. in the early-'90s. Its beat is sampled from Jackson 5's "ABC" and Berry Gordy, Jr. got a writing credit for the song.

The song was one of the first rap songs to become a pop hit when it reached number 6 in the US and number 35 in the UK in 1991. MTV picked up on its video, and it got heavy airplay on Yo! MTV Raps that year, inspiring a remake of the song as "Down Wit' MTV."

The title is an initialism for "other people's penis/pussy," and when the song asks the listener if they're "Down with O.P.P.," it is asking the listener if he/she is willing to have sexual relations with a person who is known to already have a boyfriend or girlfriend ("O.P.P"). Lead rapper Treach coyly obscures the meaning of the "P" using euphemisms throughout the song saying - instead of "pussy" - that it's "another way to call a cat a kitten" or - instead of penis - a "five-letter word rhyming with 'cleanest' or 'meanest'".

Treach was inspired to write the lyrics by a drug dealer in his former neighborhood who used to move in on other dealers' territories and say he was "Down With O.P.M. - Other People's Money." Treach took a liking to the phrase but decided to remove the "M" and add a second "P".

The song's popularity can be credited to the group's keen pop sensibilities. They gave the song a broader appeal by making the lyrics accessible to both male and female listeners, and added the "yeah, you know me..." which allows audience participation in the song.

Its b-side is "The Wickedest Man Alive".

[edit] Pop culture references

O.P.P. was parodied in the song Entropy by Ken Leavitt-Lawrence under his fictional rapper persona MC Hawking.

O.P.P. was used in an episode of Fresh Prince of Bel-Air when Will gets a car.

The song was in a scene of Jarhead as well as mentioned in the movie Malibu's Most Wanted.

A Robocop-themed parody of the song (with the chorus changed to "You down wit' OCP?") appeared in a skit on the TV show Meltdown.

In 2006, a parody of the song was used to advertise the USA Network television series Monk: replacing O.P.P. with O.C.D. (obsessive-compulsive disorder), a psychiatric disorder of the title character, Adrian Monk.

The song was used in The Dundies episode of the American version of the sitcom The Office.

Referenced in Rage Against the Machine's song "Without a Face", with the chorus line modified to "You down with DDT? Yeah, you know me".

The song features in the film Jarhead, released in 2005. The song is used during a New Years eve celebration for 1990/1 which was 9 months before the release date of the song.

In the Toni Braxton song "Love Affair", which is about a woman resisting cheating on her boyfriend with another man, Braxton sings that she "isn't down with O.P.P.".

[edit] Chart performance

Chart	Peak position
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	6
U.S. Hot Rap Singles	1
U.S. Hot R&B/Hip Hop Singles & Tracks	5
U.S. Hot Dance Music/Club Play	7
U.S. Hot Dance Music/Maxi-Singles Sales	1
UK Singles Chart	35