The 2013 J Cole song about the dangers of Los Angeles
J Cole has always had an uneasy relationship with fame and success. The tension he feels about it often finds its way into his music, and nowhere is that more obvious than on ‘Land of the Snakes.’
This song featured on his second album, Born Sinner, released in 2013, while he was riding the wave of his early career successes. He was a star now, and that came with good and bad effects upon his life.
If one place on Earth represents fame more than any other, it is surely Los Angeles, home of Hollywood and the stars. LA is a seductive place for aspiring artists and celebrities, but it bears the potential to mess with people’s characters in unsavoury ways. That’s what ‘Land of the Snakes’ deals with.
On the surface, the song sees Cole recounting his experiences of pulling women and enjoying one-night stands. He evidently got his kicks out of doing this, but, by the third verse, it has occurred to him that this behaviour isn’t good at all. He meets someone he once had a one-night stand with, who he now realises was hurt by his discarding of her. He now regrets his behaviour.
In the verse, Cole meets this woman in Los Angeles, a place that is full of “snakes.” These are sneaky, amoral characters pursuing their own selfish ends, and are clearly undesirable people to have in one’s life. Upon meeting that woman he hurt, however, Cole realises that he, too, has been a snake.
“That song’s about my love for LA,” Cole explained to Hard Knock TV in 2013. “But how dangerous I see it is, ’cause I see people – rappers, whoever – and they start to believe, ‘I’m this character,’ and you lose touch with reality. [The] song is a warning for that.”
Cole understands LA to be a “place where people can lose themselves,” especially those seduced by the idea of fame and success. He believes the pursuit of fame can make people behave in bad ways, becoming “snakes,” but meeting that woman makes him realise he is little better. The woman reminds him that he is “no better”, that he is “the snake to her”, and that he “did her dirty”.
Cole acknowledges that, in the grand scheme of things, this might seem like “a trivial thing,” but this woman was clearly hurt by his behaviour. That made it important and required self-reflection on his part. The song sees Cole try to come to terms with his one hypocrisy.
Cole viewed LA as being full of unscrupulous sorts seeking their own desires without a thought for others, without realising that he adhered to that characterisation himself. “I’m the snake to her,” he said. “I’m the shitty dude. Meanwhile, I’m walking around nervous about everybody else being shitty, or being fake or being whatever.”