Luke Marsden quizzes the students who rapped Gangsta’s Paradise with Coolio – in their front room
Years ago to go viral on YouTube you had to sing a rendition of I Dreamed A Dream whilst dressed as Mrs Doubtfire but not anymore! A group of Preston based Uni students learned the key ingredients to getting over a million views simply lie in a fifty year old American rapper.
I asked Rebecca Billinge (one of the girls more in tune on the YouTube rendition of Gangsters Paradise) to describe the feeling when Artis Leon Ivey Jr (Coolio to you and I) turned up on her doorstep, “Just surreal, we couldn’t believe he actually came.” I bet he was thinking the same thing; it’s a far cry from hanging out with Mini-Me in the Celebrity Big Brother House…
“Cooking with Coolio” was actually happening in a rented-student house in a little northern town and unlike his US TV show this one had no fear of being axed. “We had to go to Tesco to buy all the stuff,” Claudia Doherty told me (another one of the better singers in the video). I asked if he had a clubcard? “No and we had to buy all the stuff, it was over £75!” Wait…are you honestly telling me a guy who won the MTV Best Rap Video in 1996 couldn’t afford to shell out for some chicken breasts?!
“He pointed out the 3 for 2 bargains in the shop though,” Claudia informed me. Oh what a relief, he isn’t as reckless as I thought.
Now luckily for Coolio, he went to a student house that just so happened to have a guitar player there and a guitar, so once he’d marinated his chicken he told them it was time for a rendition of his Grammy Award winning song. I asked Rebecca if everybody knew the lyrics (let’s not assume).
“No I had to mime the words to some of the girls.” Poor Coolio although in his defence a lot of the girls would’ve been two years old when this song was released. Now the video speaks for itself and for his age Coolio looks great and I’m impressed he can still remember the words to his own song…
“We just thought it would be a typical Monday night out,” Claudia told me. Well if typical involves Coolio telling you to put the kettle on then I suppose it was. I’ve always been curious what international superstars smell like, do they smell like money? Fame? Desperation? “One of the girls said he smelt like her Dad.” thanks Rebecca. I wonder if he was wearing the fragrance of a well known brand like ‘Callum’ by Callum Best?
“The food was really nice, chicken-ala-damn as he called it was a speciality of his,” Claudia told me as though it was as finger lickin’ good as other chicken meals students eat. Although I can see ‘chicken a la damn’ being a meal they have to create on the next series of Masterchef!
So will the girls be staying in touch with their new found BFF? “He said the group of us could all go stay with him in Las Vegas!” Now that IS an offer I wouldn’t refuse, this could be the start of a new movement where UK students help US musicians bring their back catalogue to a whole new audience. I’ll see if Jedward are still in touch with Vanilla Ice… Relive the special moment below…