"Dear John" is a single by
MC Lyte featuring
Common
Common may refer to:
Places
* Common, a townland in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland
* Boston Common, a central public park in Boston, Massachusetts
* Cambridge Common, common land area in Cambridge, Massachusetts
* Clapham Common, originally com ...
& 10Beats from her subsequent eighth solo album ''
Legend''.
The song seeks to give a positive message about maintaining a father-son relationship and also serves as the official anthem of #EducateOURMen, the scholarship arm of the MC Lyte foundation's Hip Hop Sisters Network. It chart on the real-time
US ''Billboard'' + Twitter Trending 140, where it peaked 3,
being Lyte's first solo work to appear on a chart since her album ''
Da Undaground Heat, Vol. 1
''Da Undaground Heat, Vol. 1'' is the seventh studio album and ninth album released overall by MC Lyte. It was released on March 18, 2003 for iMusic and was produced by Maad Phunk, Gerard Harmon, Fred Crawford, Keith Wilkins and MC Lyte.
''Da Und ...
''.
Content
The track is an open letter to men, asking, ''"You wanna be ballas, shot-callers, dippin 'in the Benz straight lawless?/Or, would you rather be fathers to your daughters, even though it's getting harder?"''.
Release and promotion
The song had a music video featuring a collection of photos ranging from dads spending time with their children, to images of black community pillars like
Cornel West,
W. E. B. Du Bois
William Edward Burghardt Du Bois ( ; February 23, 1868 – August 27, 1963) was an American-Ghanaian sociologist, socialist, historian, and Pan-Africanist civil rights activist. Born in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, Du Bois grew up in ...
,
Harry Belafonte,
Bill Cosby,
Arthur Ashe
Arthur Robert Ashe Jr. (July 10, 1943 – February 6, 1993) was an American professional tennis player who won three Grand Slam singles titles. He started to play tennis at six years old. He was the first black player selected to the Unite ...
,
B.B. King,
Martin Luther King Jr.,
Malcolm X,
Russell Simmons
Russell Wendell Simmons (born October 4, 1957) is an American entrepreneur, writer and record executive. He co-founded the hip-hop label Def Jam Recordings, and created the clothing fashion lines Phat Farm, Argyleculture, and Tantris. Simmons' ...
, and
Jackie Robinson
Jack Roosevelt Robinson (January 31, 1919 – October 24, 1972) was an American professional baseball player who became the first African American to play in Major League Baseball (MLB) in the modern era. Robinson broke the baseball color line ...
.
In October 14, 2014, MC Lyte performed Dear John to President
Barack Obama in the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the legislation that created the
National Endowment for the Humanities and the
National Endowment for the Arts.
Charts
References
{{MC Lyte
2014 singles
MC Lyte songs
2014 songs
Songs written by MC Lyte