O’Shea “Ice Cube” Jackson Sr. stars in the new animated Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem. To promote the motion picture, the Hip Hop legend sat down for an interview with Capital XTRA.
Part of that Evenings with Omah Howard conversation included Ice Cube reflecting on the 50th anniversary of Hip Hop culture taking place in 2023. Howard asked the emcee/actor to name some of his favorite all-time rap tracks.
“I love ‘Rebel Without a Pause’ by Public Enemy, I go bananas over that. I still love ‘The Show’ by Doug E. Fresh. That still goes crazy,” stated Ice Cube before also rapping bars from “Party Up” by DMX.
The 54-year-old West Coast representative continued, “Y’all gonna make me lose my mind, up in here, up in here… That goes cray-cray. So, there are a few songs that go crazy. I like [‘Hate Me Now’] by Nas. That goes crazy.”
Ice Cube’s own music catalog contains classic songs as a member of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame-inducted N.W.A rap group. In addition, his solo career produced hits such as “Steady Mobbin,” “It Was a Good Day,” and “Check Yo Self.”
Before providing his voice to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, Cube acted in films like Boyz n the Hood, Friday, The Players Club, and Barbershop. The cast of director Jeff Rowe’s version of TMNT also features Micah Abbey, Shamon Brown Jr., Nicolas Cantu, Brady Noon, Jackie Chan, Seth Rogen, Post Malone, and more.
“Playing a villain is great. There are no rules playing a villain so it was just fun to be able to let loose,” Cube told Omah Howard about voicing the Superfly character in Mutant Mayhem. “Superfly is the king of New York, everybody knows his name in the streets. Nothing happens in New York without going through Superfly or it’s gonna be a problem.”