U Can't Touch This

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“U Can't Touch This”
Single by MC Hammer from the album Please Hammer Don't Hurt 'Em
Released	June/July 1990
Format	CD single Vinyl record Cassette
Genre	Pop rap Hip hop
Length	4:17
Label	Capitol Records (US)
Writer(s)	MC Hammer, Rick James
Producer	MC Hammer
MC Hammer singles chronology
"They Put Me in the Mix" (1989) "U Can't Touch This" (1990) "Have You Seen Her" (1990)

"U Can't Touch This" was MC Hammer's most widely-known single, propelling sales of its album, Please Hammer Don't Hurt 'Em, which for a time was the best-selling rap album of all time, selling over ten million copies.^[1] The song heavily samples Rick James's "Super Freak"; James is accordingly credited as a co-author. The lyrics, written entirely by Hammer, are in the boastful self-promotional style common in hip hop. They describe the rapper as having "toured around the world, from London to the Bay" and as being "magic on the mic," which Hammer says combines with Rick James' "beat that you can't touch" to create the perfect rap song. While some critics, especially in the gangsta rap community, disliked the song, enough people approved of it to secure the Grammys for Best R&B Song and Best Rap Solo Performance, a brand new category at the time, for MC Hammer. The song also did well on the charts, peaking at #8 on the Billboard Hot 100 and topping the chart in Australia. It also reached #3 on the UK singles chart.

Contents 1 Song's occurrences in the media 1.1 Commercials 1.2 Movies 1.3 Other 2 Uses of the word "hammertime!" 2.1 Sports 2.2 Video games 2.3 Movies 2.4 TV 2.5 Music 2.6 Computers 2.7 Stickers 3 References

[edit] Song's occurrences in the media

[edit] Commercials

• Anti-bacterial hand cream Purell.
• Insurance firm Nationwide in a commercial. Hammer himself also starred in the commercial, which spoofs his bankruptcy.
• Connecticut Light and Power's television and radio ads, where "U can't touch this!" is used whenever power lines are mentioned (visually or verbally).
• Diet Pepsi/Pepsi One commercial, "I wanna kick it old school."
• Toyota commercial.
• Target Corporation commercials in the late '90's. "Target Time" was used in place of "Hammer Time".
• Hand sanitizer commercial for Lysol (U Can't Touch Germs!)
• Lay's chips
• Acura 3.2 TL commercial
• Citibank TV commercial for credit account. Aired in Norway 2006
• Renault French TV commercial for Renault engines
• Hallmark Father's Day card commercial. Hammer was voiced by a father.
• Nissan TV Commercial for Nissan Serena, Presage, Elgrand and Lafesta Highway Star Minivans. Aired in Japan 2007

[edit] Movies

• Class Act (1992)
• Hot Shots! (1991)
• The Super
• Don't Be a Menace To South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood (1996) One of the main characters, Crazy Legs, is asked if he has a dream. He thinks about the question for a second then the film dissolves into a dream sequence that features the crippled Crazy Legs performing a long, choreographed dance sequence wearing parachute pants to an instrumental version of "U Can't Touch This."
• The Right Connections (1997) (TV)
• The Master of Disguise (2002)
• Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003)
• Shark Tale (2004) is frequently sung throughout the film, and at the end of the bonus movie Club Oscar calling it "Oscar time".
• White Chicks
• Bubble Boy
• Kung Pow: Enter the Fist
• Eurotrip In Bratislava, the old man says "Stop, Hammertime!"
• American Dreamz (2006)
• Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (2006)
• Uglydoll Gets Down (2007)
• Into the Wild (2007)
• Little Miss Sunshine (2007) Danced by Olive

[edit] Other

• Performed live at the MTV Video Music Awards 2005]
• A Whac-A-Mole arcade game released in Japan.^{[citation needed]}
• Some Cambridge United fans sign the tune and then replace 'U Can't Touch This' with star striker's name: 'Lee Boylan'.
• A skill in the PC MMORPG Video Game Guild Wars.
• Gröûp X Made a parody of the song called "Down't Touch That (I Demand)".
• Flash Animation by Mark Zaverhuka called "Resident Cactuar."
• Paul Orndorff used the song for his entrance music in the Herb Abrams-owned UWF.
• The German translation Halt! Hammerzeit is a known internet meme.

^[2][3]

[edit] Uses of the word "hammertime!"

The word "hammertime" from the song ("Stop! (one-beat pause) Hammertime!") has appeared in numerous other contexts:

[edit] Sports

• In 1990, players and fans of the Cincinnati Reds adopted "U Can't Touch This" as an unofficial anthem, in particular with reference to the Nasty Boys, the team's trio of ace relief pitchers.
• The Detroit Pistons basketball team used "hammertime" as their slogan during their repeat NBA championships in 1989 and 1990. "U Can't Touch This" referring to their championship.
• Skateboarders use the term to refer to a particularly courageous and extreme manoeuvre, also called "throwing down a hammer".
• The Tampa Bay Lightning published a poster featuring defenceman Roman Hamrlík with the tag line "Hamr Time"
• The Hamilton Tigercats, from Hamilton, Ontario, Canada which is often referred to as "The Hammer", have given away "Hammer Time" Ticats signs.

[edit] Video games

• In the Half-Life mod The Specialists there is a level called "Hammertime". The song plays from a radio in the level.
• In the MMORPG Kingdom of Loathing, one of the adventures involves a man coming up to the player carrying a hammer and saying, "Hey, man, it's hammer time!"
• In the video game Super Mario RPG, the Hammer Bros. boss uses an attack called Hammer Time.
• In the video game Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos and its expansion The Frozen Throne, Dwarf Griffon Riders, an Alliance unit, speak the phrase "It's hammer time!" upon completion of their training at the Gryphon Aviary building. The Paladin will also say this if clicked on repeatedly, or when summoned. Muradin Bronzebeard will occasionally say this when given an order to attack. All of these units are armed with war hammers.
• In the video game Beyond Good and Evil, attacking a foe may prompt your partner to cry "Hammertime!"
• In the MMORPG "Guild Wars", there is an NPC called "Mac Snowhammer" who says "Snowhammer, don't hurt 'em!", "You can't dodge this!", and "Stop! Snowhammer time!" And there is a skill called "Can't touch this!"
• In the 1990 arcade game "Hammering Harry", a sample of MC Hammer saying "Hammertime!" proceeds each level.
• In the Shark Tale video game you have to dance in a dance-mat style to 'U cant touch this' to complete one of the levels.
• In the Adventure Game "Al Emmo and the Lost Dutchman's Mine" when randomly using a hammer.
• In Halo 3, there is a game mode named Hammerzeit. "Zeit" means "time" in German.
• In the MMORPG World of Warcraft, the Male Orc dance is based on the dance sequences in U Can't Touch This.

[edit] Movies

• In the 3D animation Shark Tale, when at a meeting with the sharks, the main character, Oscar, sings a line of "U Can't Touch This," and finishes by saying "Stop! Oscar-time!".
• Eurotrip
• The song is featured in the film Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3.

[edit] TV

• "It's Hammer Time" is the title of a Power Rangers: Operation Overdrive episode.
• In the New Zealand Film "Sione's Wedding" the line "Stop!...Bolo Time" was used, followed by a little dance.
• In an episode of Kenan and Kel, Kenan says to Kel "C'mon, It's Hammer time!" and Kel replies "Kenan? Kenan? It hasn't been Hammertime for five years!"
• In the Seinfeld episode "The Baby Shower", Kramer convinces Jerry to steal cable TV by saying "Man, it's the nineties... It's Hammer time!"
• In the South Park episode "Simpsons Already Did It", while the boys search the lab for their "sea-men", Tweek guards the door with the code word being "Hammertime". However he forgets this, and starts singing the song to remember before screaming "Hammertime!"
• The phrase "And now, it's Hammer time!" was used by the title character in the satirical police sitcom Sledge Hammer! a full three years before "U Can't Touch This" was released (in the episode "State of Sledge," which aired January 10, 1987).
• In an episode of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Carlton attempts to gain Will's acceptance by offering a high-five and saying "When the going gets tough, the tough get going. It's hammer time.".
• In a David Letterman show, "It's hammer time !" is depicted as a possible thought of the president George W. Bush while a picture, showing him unable to correctly hang a hammer, was taken.^{[citation needed]}
• In The Simpsons, the episode "Behind the Laughter" shows Homer purchasing M.C. Hammer's house, with "Hammertime" on the front gate. Homer then removes an "m" and bends the "a" so it spells "Homertime". Episode 381, the 3rd episode of the 18th season, is called "Please Homer, Don't Hammer 'Em..." which is a reference to the album title.
• In the episode of Family Guy where Peter creates Petoria, He sings "U Can't Touch Me", a very similar musical outline to "U Can't Touch This". Peter says "Peter-Time". MC Hammer also features in this song and Peter does his characteristic "fall on back".
• In the Scrubs episode "My Tormented Mentor" (Season 3), Doctor Miller turns off Turk's hip-hop music, saying "There's no music in my OR Hammer." To which Turk responds "First of all, Hammer dances like this...", proceeds to dance in a similar style to MC Hammer, and ends by pointing to his wrist-watch and stating "Hammer Time!"
• On MythBusters, on the myth of the Exploding Trousers, Robert Lee, the American narrator said, "It's hammer time." This was when the Build Time were testing impact as an ignition source via a robotic hammer.
• The Bart Gets Famous episode of the Simpsons, it appeared with changed lyrics "I didn't do it!", although the rhythm is the same as in original song.

[edit] Music

• Comedian Jimmy Fallon's The Bathroom Wall album features a song called "Hammertime" that cobbles together lyrics from several unrelated songs.
• In the Eminem song "Just Lose It" the line "Stop!... Pajama time!" is used (Eminem also parodies MC Hammer's dancing style in the song's music video).
• "Weird Al" Yankovic parodied the song twice, once as I Can't Watch This and once as Don't Touch That
• Parodied by Camo J's track "Can't Code This".

[edit] Computers

• On AMD K8-based microprocessors such as Athlon64 and Opteron, CPUID function 0x8FFFFFFF returns the string "IT'S HAMMER TIME" in registers EAX, EBX, ECX, and EDX^[4]. The K8 project was codenamed "Hammer" when in development at AMD.
• A Stop! Hammertime! extension for the Firefox web browser that causes the computer to respond "Stop, Hammertime!" whenever a custom "Stop" button is pressed.[1]

[edit] Stickers

• Various HAMMERTIME stickers can be found, in stop-sign red colour, with the disclaimer that they are "Not Intended To Be Used On Stop Signs".

[edit] References

Preceded by "Tomorrow (A Better You, A Better Me)" by Quincy Jones featuring Tevin Campbell	Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs number one single June 23, 1990	Succeeded by "All I Do Is Think of You" by Troop
Preceded by "It Must Have Been Love" by Roxette	Australian ARIA Singles Chart number-one single July 21, 1990 - August 25, 1990	Succeeded by "Epic" by Faith No More