Clipse / Mr. Me Too (feat. Pharrell Williams) - Single / 2006
Mr. Me Too
cocky, dismissive, triumphant
Clipse return from a label-imposed hiatus with a boast track built around a running joke: everyone who imitated them during their absence is now dismissed as "Mr. Me Too." The song stacks luxury brand-names and coke-rap imagery into a case for authenticity, using the hook's mocking echo as its real punchline.
authenticity vs. imitation conspicuous consumption industry resentment street credibility return from exile
Who's speaking
The narrator shifts between Pusha T and Malice, both speaking in first person directly to rivals and copycats, with an unnamed 'you' standing in for anyone biting their style; the voice is boastful and largely unreliable in the sense that it's performative swagger rather than confession.
What happens
The song opens with a declaration of return after time away, then moves through a catalog of wealth and status markers accumulated or maintained during that absence, implicitly contrasting the duo's continued success with those who tried to replicate it. It builds toward the explicit naming of the 'Me Too' phenomenon, turns into a mocking call-and-response in the hook, and closes by looping back through more material one-upmanship, ending on a live-for-the-moment flex.
How it's built
Built on a loose verse-hook-verse structure typical of mid-2000s hip-hop singles, but the hook itself is the structural engine -- its stuttering echo-response format ('I know, I know... you too') turns repetition into mockery rather than mere refrain. The verses function less as narrative progression and more as parallel lists of status symbols, reinforcing the theme through accumulation rather than development.
Section by section
Opening verse
The song announces the duo's comeback with an almost territorial clearing of space, immediately pivoting into comparisons with major-label players to assert they never really left the top tier despite the layoff.'
Travel verse
“out in Aspen”
Shifting from street-corner specifics to jet-setting imagery signals a claim to crossover wealth, positioning the narrator among celebrity peers rather than just neighborhood dealers.
First hook entrance
The title concept lands here, reframing everything said before as proof of originality being copied; the hook's clipped, echoing delivery mimics the very mimicry it mocks.
"Two years" verse
“Been two years”
This section most directly addresses the hiatus, implying the narrator assumed the field would be held in their absence and expressing contempt that others merely imitated without matching output.
Closing verse
The final verse doubles down on material specificity and threat, ending on a carpe-diem line that frames the extravagance as both earned and urgent, given the risks implied earlier in the song.
Craft
- catalog/list structure
- Verses pile up brand names, locations, and luxury items in rapid succession, using sheer volume of detail to simulate an overwhelming, untouchable lifestyle.
- apostrophe
- The narrator speaks directly to an unnamed imitator throughout, making the entire song a one-sided confrontation that never lets the addressee respond except through the mocking hook.
- irony/mockery via repetition
- The hook repeats the addressee's imagined boasts back in a flat, dismissive cadence, turning imitation itself into the joke -- the repetition undercuts rather than celebrates.
- extended metaphor (drug trade as business)
- References to product, movement, and reinvestment frame criminal enterprise in the language of corporate success, aligning street credibility with entrepreneurial legitimacy.
Reading it
The most persuasive reading treats this as a meta-commentary on hip-hop's cycle of imitation -- Clipse positioning themselves as originators whose style, slang, and persona get copied the moment they step back, with the hook literalizing that theft as a verbal tic. A secondary reading hears the song as straightforward hiatus-ending chest-thumping, with the 'Me Too' conceit just a clever hook rather than a sustained argument about authorship; both readings coexist since the verses function more as flexing than as a developed thesis.
Context
This single marked Clipse's return after Hell Hath No Fury was delayed by label disputes with Jive Records, which the lyrics allude to directly when referencing unfair treatment by the label. The Neptunes-affiliated Star Trak imprint and Pharrell's presence situate the track within that production ecosystem, and the song functions partly as a statement of continued relevance after the delay.
Listen for
- the clipped, almost robotic delivery of the hook's echo-response structure
- the shift in geographic scale between street-level and jet-set imagery
- how specific brand and model names function as rhythmic elements, not just flexes
- the bitterness beneath the boasting when the hiatus is addressed directly
About Clipse
Clipse, also known as the Clipse, are an American hip-hop duo from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Formed in 1994, it consists of brothers Gene "Malice" and Terrence "Pusha T" Thornton.
1992 - present / United States
Full biography and catalogue