"Children's Story" is a single by British

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

-born American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 hip hop

Hip hop

Hip hop is a form of musical expression and artistic culture that originated in African-American and Latino communities during the 1970s in New York City, specifically the Bronx. DJ Afrika Bambaataa outlined the four pillars of hip hop culture: MCing, DJing, breaking and graffiti writing...

 artist Slick Rick

Slick Rick

Richard Walters , better known by his stage name Slick Rick is a Grammy-nominated English-American rapper...

, from his album The Great Adventures of Slick Rick

The Great Adventures of Slick Rick

-Samples used:*"Children's Story" samples "Think " by Lyn Collins & "Nautilus" by Bob James*"The Moment I Feared" samples "Funky Drummer" by James Brown", "Take Me to the Mardi Gras" by Bob James & "Peter Piper" by Run-D.M.C....

.

Reception

It's on the list of the top 100 rap songs, and is ranked #61 on VH1's 100 Greatest Songs of Hip Hop.

Covers

The song has been covered by:

• Tricky
  Tricky
  Tricky is an English musician and actor. As a producer and a musician, he is noted for a dark, rich and layered sound and a whispering sprechgesang lyrical style. Culturally, Tricky encourages an intertwining of societies, particularly in his musical fusion of rock and hip hop, high art and pop...
  
   on his 1996 album Nearly God
  Nearly God
  -Album name, recording history, collaborators:The album's title comes from an interview where Tricky was asked "So how does it feel to be God... well, nearly God."...
  
  ,
• Everlast
  Everlast (musician)
  Erik Francis Schrody , better known by his stage name Everlast, is a Grammy Award-winning American rapper and songwriter, known for his solo hit "What It's Like" and as the front-man for rap group House of Pain. He is also part of the hip-hop supergroup La Coka Nostra, which consists of members of...
  
   on his 2000 album Eat at Whitey's
  Eat at Whitey's
  Eat at Whitey's is the third solo album by Everlast. It features guests collaborations with Carlos Santana, B-Real, Rahzel, N'Dea Davenport, Cee-Lo, Warren Haynes, and Kurupt. The lead single was "Black Jesus."-Track listing:# "Whitey" – 1:35...
  
  ,
• Black Star (Talib Kweli
  Talib Kweli
  Talib Kweli Greene , better known as Talib Kweli, is an American hip-hop artist and poet from Brooklyn, New York. His first name in Arabic means "student" or "seeker" ; his in Swahili means "true"...
  
   and Mos Def
  Mos Def
  Dante Terrell Smith is an American actor and Emcee known by the stage names Mos Def and Yasiin Bey. He started his hip hop career in a group called Urban Thermo Dynamics, after which he appeared on albums by Da Bush Babees and De La Soul. With Talib Kweli, he formed the duo Black Star, which...
  
  ) on their collaborative album Black Star,
• Eminem re-interpreted it as a diss song entitled "Can-I-Bitch"; including shots towards Jermaine Dupri
  Jermaine Dupri
  Jermaine Dupri Mauldin , known as Jermaine Dupri or JD, is an American record producer, songwriter and rapper.- Early life and career :...
  
   and Canibus
  Canibus
  Germaine Williams , better known by his stage name Canibus, is a Jamaican-born American rapper. He is a part of supergroup The HRSMN. Canibus rose to fame in the mid-nineties...
  
  . It follows the flow and concept as the original, including the intro of children asking "Marshall, will you please tell us a bedtime story?".
• The Game
  The Game (rapper)
  Jayceon Terrell Taylor , better known by his stage name Game, formerly The Game, is an American rapper and actor. As a member of G-Unit, he rose to fame in 2005 with the success of his debut album, The Documentary, which earned him two Grammy Award nominations...
  
   on his 2008 Mixtape BWS Radio 5; and was entitled "Compton's Story". He uses an accent much like Slick Rick's throughout the song.

In 2004, "Children's Story" appeared in the video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is a 2004 open world action video game developed by British games developer Rockstar North and published by Rockstar Games. It is the third 3D game in the Grand Theft Auto video game franchise, the fifth original console release and eighth game overall...

, on classic hip hop

Old school hip hop

Old school hip hop describes the earliest commercially recorded hip hop music , and the music in the period preceding it from which it was directly descended . Old school hip hop is said to end around 1983 or 1984 with the emergence of Run–D.M.C., the first new school hip hop group...

 radio station Playback FM. The song was also featured on the True Crime: New York City

True Crime: New York City

True Crime: New York City is an urban sandbox-style action-adventure videogame published by Activision and developed by Luxoflux for the Xbox, PlayStation 2, and GameCube consoles and Windows based computers. It is the second game of the True Crime series, released after True Crime: Streets of LA...

soundtrack and Tony Hawk's Proving Ground

Tony Hawk's Proving Ground

Tony Hawk's Proving Ground is a video game developed by Neversoft for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 video game consoles; by Page 44 Studios for the PlayStation 2 and Wii; and by Vicarious Visions for the Nintendo DS...

.

Montell Jordan

Montell Jordan

Montell Jordan is a former American R&B singer-songwriter and record producer. Jordan became the main solo male artist on its Def Soul imprint until leaving the label in 2003. Of his live performances it is often regarded that he is a rock oriented musician, with Jordan even going as far as to...

 samples this song in "This Is How We Do It

This Is How We Do It

"This Is How We Do It" is a 1995 song by American R&B singer Montell Jordan. This song, Jordan's first single, is representative of the new jack swing style popular at the time, featuring Jordan singing over an enhanced sample of Slick Rick's "Children's Story." "This is How We Do It" was...

", as does Ol' Dirty Bastard

Ol' Dirty Bastard

Russell Tyrone Jones was an American rapper and occasional producer, who went by the stage name Ol' Dirty Bastard or simply ODB...

 in "Got Your Money

Got Your Money

"Got Your Money" is a single by American hip-hop artist Ol' Dirty Bastard, taken from his second full length LP Nigga Please. Both the single and the album were released on Elektra Records in 1999. The song was produced by The Neptunes...

".

The lyrics "Knock 'em out the box" were also used in Star Wars Gangsta Rap

Star Wars Gangsta Rap

The Star Wars Gangsta Rap is a parody song based on the original Star Wars trilogy. The song was later popularized as a Flash music video and was the first winner of the Audience Choice Award in the Lucasfilm-sponsored Official Star Wars Fan Film Awards.-Version history:The Star Wars Gangsta Rap...

.

The Black Eyed Peas sampled this song in their song Light Up The Night from their 2010 album The Beginning.

The song was also played in the film Notorious

Notorious (2009 film)

Notorious is a 2009 American biographical film about the life of iconic hip hop star The Notorious B.I.G. who is played by Jamal Woolard. The film co-stars Angela Bassett as his mother Voletta Wallace, Derek Luke as Sean Combs, and Anthony Mackie as Tupac Shakur...

.

The lyrics "I need bullets, hurry up run!" are also used by Eminem in the track "Bad Guys Always Die" featuring Dr. Dre from the Wild Wild West (soundtrack)

Wild Wild West (soundtrack)

-Sample Credits:*"Wild Wild West" contains portions of "I Wish" performed and written by Stevie Wonder and "Wild Wild West" written by Mohandas DeWese*"Confused" contains an interpolation of "Cover Action" written by Wilton Felder...

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