Big Punisher f/Joe - Still Not A Player

Since the song was recently included on the new 2015 Vacation soundtrack, and because there are not any promo CD details in the database, here's some information.

RDJ-65436-2
1. Radio Version (listed 3:56; actual 3:57)
2. Album Version (listed 3:56; actual 3:57)
3. TV Track (listed 3:56; actual 3:57)

The database doesn't currently specify which is on each CD, but there are two very different vocals takes for the Radio Version and Album Version. The former has the lyrics "I'm not a player, I just crush a lot," while the latter says "I'm not a player, I just f--k a lot."

One interesting thing about the above promo is that the TV Track contains the dirty version. For those who may not be aware, a "TV Track" was typically created for television performances, so it's more than simply an instrumental. It usually contains background vocals and ad-libs, most often only omitting the lead vocal. Seems odd that they would've used a dirty version for a TV Track, but that's what happened in this case.

I also have an official Loud/RCA promo CD-R with the "Pop Edit." It's a 1-track disc, and the song has an actual run time of 3:31. Now, this one is really interesting! For one, ALL of Big Punisher's lead vocals have been removed. Yup, that's right. The main artist of the song barely appears on this version, leaving only Joe's singing, along with a few ad libs by Big Pun and his one line in the chorus "I'm not a player, I just crush a lot." But the real kicker is that the vocal track used for Joe's part is taken from the dirty version. Loud and clear, right at the end of the chorus, you can hear Joe sing "who's down to f--k tonight?"

This has to be one of the biggest blunders in the history of creating "pop edits" for CHR radio, and I cannot imagine any station airing this version. I certainly have never heard it anywhere else, but there you have it.

Edited by aaronk

Eric, without question, "Still Not A Player" is a remix of "I'm Not A Player." In this case, though, like you said, the term remix = an entire re-working of the song. Technically, "I'm Not A Player" had it's own chart run, peaking at #57 in 1997. I also have a promo CD for this song, which took me a while to track down, as it's not as common as "Still Not A Player." If anyone is interested, I can post the details, but for Pat's database, this would be considered a non-hit version.

Pat, I only have the full-length clean album, so I can't be much help.

I received an email from a gentleman named Brendan, who was able to supply some info about the "Pop Edit." Hopefully he doesn't mind me sharing the info.

I was the production director at Fun 107 (WFHN/New Bedford) and we were pretty strict about staying away from songs that contained any type of rap, unless we were playing them at night. J.R. (Fun 107's PD) gave [me] the promo CD of "Still Not A Player" - the CD had only 3 versions - the radio version, the album version, and a version called "TV Track". The instructions: make a rapless version of the song, so we could spin it during the day (being a rhythmic CHR in a small city with a pretty big Portuguese population, the song had a pretty good buzz). It was a homework assignment for me, because the station didn't own a CD burner - I had one at home, and CD-R's were selling for about $5 each. The T.V. track was basically an instrumental version, with those Big Pun ad-libs... when you hear "Big Pun... Guns... Ton!", it's from the T.V. Track. Only the first chorus of the T.V. track had Big Pun's signature line in the chorus... "I'm not a player, I just crush a lot". The other choruses in the T.V. track were missing Big Pun (who knows why), so each time you hear the chorus, it's a repeat of the first one. The T.V. track's verses were a mess... they contained even more of those Big Pun ad-libs, but they made absolutely no sense with most of the lyrics removed, so I didn't use them. To make the rapless version of the song more than just a loop of choruses, I used the bridge of the song from the T.V. track as verses... "in the hot hot tub, bubblin'... in the spot love..., etc.", then used the "boricua, morena" part in to tie it all together. At about 3-and-a-half minutes long, it was as good as it gets. It was probably a bad assumption that the "T.V. Track" was suitable for radio airplay... honestly, I hadn't bothered to listen closely to cut 1 - the radio version - before attempting to make the rapless version, because it was still pretty filthy for an edited song. I was so eager to get Big Pun's parts off of the song while somehow managing to keep it a Big Punisher record that I paid no attention to the chorus parts I was using... from the "T.V. Track". I only realized they said "who's down to f*ck tonight" when I read your post on Top40MusicOnCD the other night, went back and listened to my rapless version and realized that this error got past my PD, Loud Records, and whoever played this version on the air. Oops! We played the heck out of this version on Fun 107, but BDS/Soundscan wasn't picking up our spins... it was pretty much a different song compared to the radio version. We sent Loud Records a copy so they could at least get it into the Soundscan database, and there was mention that they'd consider distributing it to other stations. There was one problem, according to our rep at Loud... with so little Big Punisher on the song, what I had put together was pretty much a Joe record, and Joe was signed to another label. So, my version went nowhere. You might have the only CD copy of the "Pop Edit" in existence. I'm no longer at Fun 107 and the song is long out of their rotation, but I still have an MP3 file of the song edit I put together... and yeah, now that I've given it another listen, it's time to fix that chorus. :)

Edited by aaronk