Why Diddy Initially Did Not Like ‘Kick in the Door’ on The Notorious B.I.G’s ‘Life After Death’

In the mid-1990s, The Notorious B.I.G. began working on his sophomore album, 1997’s Life After Death. Following the success of his 1994 debut Ready to Die, Biggie had a tough act to follow. On Life After Death, the rapper flexed his talents with songs like the braggadocious “Kick in the Door.” But his friend Sean “Diddy” Combs, who signed Biggie to his Bad Boy Records label, wasn’t a fan of the song.

The Notorious B.I.G. recorded ‘Kick in the Door’ in 1 take

The Notorious B.I.G. recorded “Kick in the Door” in late 1996 after he was in a near-fatal car accident with his Junior M.A.F.I.A. groupmate Lil’ Cease. In the early stages of his recovery, he used a wheelchair to get around with the help of others. He wasted no time in getting back to work.

According to the 2022 book It Was All a Dream: Biggie and the World That Made Him, hip-hop’s “Fashion King” Groovey Lew was at the studio when Biggie came in to record “Kick in the Door.” Lew watched in awe as Biggie took the mic and laid down his verse in one go after listening to the beat on repeat.

“That man sat in that wheelchair and did that verse. In one take, [just] off the head! Genius s***!” Lew said. “I was like, Yo, you the illest. He was like, ‘Groove, get outta here, B!’ I was like ‘I’m good. I’m going home.’ I just left the studio. That was history.” 

Diddy didn’t like the song

In 2003, various people involved with the creation of Life After Death spoke about bringing “Kick in the Door” to life in an interview with XXL. Producer DJ Premier admitted that Diddy wasn’t a fan of the track.

“Puff didn’t like that record. When I gave him the track he caught me on the elevator and told me, ‘This is not hot, Preme. I need something more blazin’, like “Unbelievable.”‘ I was like, ‘That s*** right there is hot.’ He’s like, ‘I need a Tunnel [nightclub] banger.’ I said, ‘That’s a Tunnel banger.’ He goes, ‘You ain’t hittin’ it like you used to.’ That’s exactly what he said,” Premier recounted. “I thought he was doing it just to f*** with me, because that’s when he really started traveling with security. I was like, OK, he just trying to make me feel small. But at the end of the day Puff is my man. Me and him is mad cool despite the fact that he did not like that particular track, and then when we did it I said, ‘I told you this s*** was gonna be hot.’ And Puff goes, ‘I told you I had to hear the lyrics first.’ I was like, ‘Yeah, aight.'”

For his part, Diddy confessed that he didn’t care for the beat of the song, but Biggie’s words made it unforgettable.

“I didn’t really like that beat at first,” Diddy recalled. “Once I heard Big’s lyrics on it, once I heard him rap, it made me like the beat, it made me understand where he was coming from. Because that’s the kind of relationship we had. You know, if I didn’t like something, he still had the freedom to try it. I would give him my opinion and most of the time he listened, but if he didn’t listen to it, it must have meant he really felt strongly. So this was one of those cases where he felt strongly on a joint.”

The song contained a diss aimed at Nas

After fellow New York rapper Nas declared himself the King of New York, Biggie decided to let his thoughts be known with “Kick in the Door.” The song was a sly dig at Nas, who called out several other rappers with his song “The Message.”

“Part of [‘Kick in the Door’] was meant for Nas but it wasn’t no real disrespectful s***, it was more like some subliminal mixtape s***,” Diddy said. “Nas was doing it. Wu-Tang was sayin’ s*** on tapes. We were all sayin’ subliminal s*** on tape, but it wasn’t to the point where, when we saw each other, we couldn’t give each other a pound and know that some s*** was said. It wasn’t like no deep s***. It was more on some clever s***, you know? Like little clever jabs, so when you hear it, you’re like, Ooh!’ Like if you were the recipient, you would laugh at it, because it wasn’t having you all out on front street. Everybody wasn’t knowin’ about it. And you could damn near get with the person and y’all could talk about it, like, ‘That s*** you said was kinda slick.'”