Jay-Z is currently the favorite poster boy for Cristal and has received approval from Roederer to use it in several of his videos, along with more than a few free cases. Why? According to a company spokesperson, it’s because Jay always presents Cristal as a status symbol, and despite their hoity-toity history, Roederer relishes the eager consumption of Cristal by Hip Hop stars. So much so that, according to a recent article in the Washington Post, they’d rather see Cristal in Hip Hop videos than movies. An upcoming film starring Sandra Bullock and Liam Neeson was promptly dissed when the film’s prop peeps put in a request for some Crist to use on the set, basically because the scenes in which the bottles were to be used just weren't jiggy enough.

The Washington Post article also attempts to trace Cristal's history in Hip Hop, concluding that the Notorious B.I.G. was the first to mention Cristal on Jay-Z's 1996 debut album, Reasonable Doubt. Well Washington Post, you were wrong, and the next time you guys decide to run a piece about Hip Hop, please try to find a writer who knows what the fuck they’re talking about.

Now for those of you who are going, “Huh? I just knew it was Big!” the fact is, although Big regularly rapped about fine beverages, prior to 1996 he was always spittin about Moet and Alize. It wasn’t until Reasonable Doubt, on the song “Brooklyn’s Finest” to be exact, did he start saying the name Cristal.

Tupac even mentioned Cristal before Big in his song “Thug Passion” off his album All Eyez On Me, which came out a few months before Reasonable Doubt. In the song, Tupac talks about a concoction consisting of “one part Alize, one part Cristal.”

But Pac wasn’t the first either, and nor was Jay-Z, whose first Cristal mention came via his 1994 single “In My Lifetime.”

The cigar actually goes to the most unusual of suspects: Rakim. He was the first to mention Cristal in his 1992 song “Juice (Know The Ledge)” from the soundtrack of the film Juice, in which Tupac, coincidentally, starred.

Peep the lyrics below:

Late for school, I catch the train
Girls sip "Cristal" and whisper my name
I push up like an exercise,
Check the intellect and inspect the thighs
Select the best one, pull her to the side
Keep her occupied for the rest of the ride
Read my resume she's know I'm 'ready, cool
Just meet me after school,
We can moan and groan until your mom come home
And you be calling me Al "Dope" Capone.

Note however that although Rakim was the first to say Cristal on wax, it is another MC who is credited with setting the trend of Cristal sipping in Hip Hop. That MC is Raekwon the Chef, who blew the Cristal floodgates wide open with his 1995 masterpiece Only Built 4 Cuban Linx.

*Any problems with this article? Anything I'm missing? Contact me directly at cl_aldave@hotmail.com.