the greatest hip-hop marketing since st. ides' crooked i

For those of you who were not privy to "Rap City" during the Prince DeJour/Joe Clair days, you might not be familiar with Crooked I. Crooked I was a fruit drink for children that was manufactured by St. Ides. The bottle was shaped like a 40 oz (although slightly smaller) and came in several flavors, not unlike Kool Aid. I'm sure St. Ides went along with the name since "Crooked I" was the slang term for their malt liquor. Crooked I and Rap City were always concurrent in my head because you couldn't watch an episode of "Rap City" without seeing five commercials for the C.I.

Well Crooked I is no longer the worst idea associated with hip-hop. I give you Hip-Hop Abs.

(Please take this time to watch the infomercial at the link. I'll wait.)

Hip-Hop Abs? I'm not sure which part of this is better, the fact that they keep mentioning that you DON'T have to do sit-ups or crunches to have well-defined abs or that their dance moves are straight out of a 1991 Heavy D video.

Best of all, Hip-Hop Abs is run by Shaun T, a dancer whose closest relation to hip-hop is that he was in "Beauty Shop." I bet he didn't even roll blunts with Latifah.

This is the kind of shit I'd expect back in 1995, maybe, but 2007? C'mon, people. This is almost as bad as Punk Rock Aerobics. Didn't we already have to suffer enough of this kind of crap with "The Grind." While we're on the subject, didn't Eric Neis have his own line of hip-hop dance exercise bullshit? Yeah, look how well that did.

Sorry, Shaun T, I guess I'll catch you at the bus stop nursing a Crooked I with your magnificent abs.