English final brings P-Unit unexpected fame, fans

For the final project for English 231 — Dirty Words: Satire, Slander and Society, many students chose to write a 10-page paper, while the more creative wrote satires, parodied comic strips and wrote mock gospels.

Nate Domingue '06 and Bob Moore '06 decided to create a satirical rap, "Generic Rap Song," that has become an Internet hit and has gotten airtime on radio stations as far away as Missouri.

"Generic Rap Song," written by Domingue and Moore under the alias of "P-Unit," pokes fun at many mainstream rappers and their styles.

Domingue and Moore had heard of each other before their English 231 project because of both's involvement in writing and producing legitimate rap projects, but "Generic Rap Song" was their first collaboration. Domingue said that as engineers, they decided to do a creative project as their final exercise instead of a 10-page paper in order to avoid writing. The idea of penning a satirical rap song was based on their shared distaste for mainstream rap.

Domingue and Moore "both really like rap," Domingue said, and they agree that most mainstream rap is "really easy to write" and unoriginal. "A lot of the instrumentals aren't musically grounded," Domingue added.

In order to show that mainstream rap is generally formulaic and all the same, Domingue and Moore set out to prove that they, too, could successfully write a "generic" rap hit. After obtaining permission from the professor to work collaboratively, they wrote and recorded the song, a process that took them about seven hours.

The song features the duo impersonating several familiar hip-hop artists rapping about the reasons for their success and rapping styles. Ja Rule admits he is a lazy lyricist, 50 Cent credits Eminem and his gunshot wounds for making him famous and DMX describes living "thug" life from his mansion. Meanwhile, P. Diddy repeats "Bad Boy!" throughout the song and J. Lo sings the hook in an off-pitch falsetto.

Domingue and Moore also made a music video for "Generic Rap Song" featuring Princeton students dressed as the rap stars. The video makes fun of the artists and also parodies the settings and props used in rap videos.

After completing the project, Domingue and Moore posted the song and video on their website, www.princeton.edu/~rmoore/punit/, and sent the link to 50 of their friends. Somehow, Domingue said, "It just got all over the Internet." They began receiving hundreds of emails raving about the song and some emails from fans of the artists they parodied.

From the website, "Generic Rap Song" spread to humor sites like CollegeHumor.com and AlbinoBlacksheep.com. While sifting through the emails, Domingue and Moore came across an email from Q106.1, a Top 40 radio station in Missouri, which said the station was playing the song and asking for an interview with P-Unit.

Domingue and Moore appeared on Q106.1's morning show and spoke with the DJs about their song. They also have heard that the song has been played on other radio stations in Philadelphia and across the country.

The success of their song surprised the pair. "We never expected it to blow up," said Domingue.

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Domingue and Moore are in the process of joining the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers in order to get their song copyrighted and receive royalties when the song is played on radio stations. Moore said that this wasn't because they expected to make much money from royalties but because they wanted "to frame the check for six cents that we get."

The pair is also encouraging friends and website visitors to vote for their video on MTV's Total Request Live as a write-in candidate. Although he isn't sure that MTV will be enthusiastic about running a video that makes fun of the artists it promotes, Moore said he thinks it would be hilarious to get the video on TRL, "sharing the stage with the people we're making fun of."