featuring fellow American rappers Kanye West and Lil Wayne, the latter of whom also produced the song, constructed primarily around a vocal sample of "Paper Planes" by British musician M.I.A.
Commercially, however, the song was a success despite a premature leak to the internet: it debuted and peaked at number five on the US Billboard Hot 100, and also charted modestly in a few overseas territories.
Diddy recorded a remix titled "Swagger Like Puff" featuring Cassie singing the chorus, which managed to peak at number seventeen on the Deutsche Black Charts.
Apathy released a freestyle over this song called "Swagga Like Ap" on the third volume of the It's the Bootleg, Muthafuckas!
Also, Drake, Fabolous, Freeway, Twista, Kid Cudi, Tinie Tempah, Flo Rida, Hot Rod and Tony Yayo have all performed or recorded freestyles over the instrumental.
[10] Once they both accepted and duly sent their (demo) vocals back to T.I., he wrote two additional verses, but only chose the last of the four he had written to actually perform on "Swagga like Us", as he felt it "stood out (better) than the others".
[8] The song was mixed by Andrew Dawson at Pacifique Recording Studios in Los Angeles, California, whilst the mastering was carried out by Chris Gehringer.
A hip hop song, "Swagga Like Us" is built around a sample of "Paper Planes" by British artist M.I.A., featuring the line, "no one on the corner had swagger like us".
[8] West added a "sumo–heavy bass" and drum line similar to that of a marching band to the vocal sample:[12] the sounds combine to form a "noisy, warbling and exaggerated electronic melody".
[13] Shannon Barbour of About.com considered it to incorporate the "leftover retro 80's electro-funk" found on West's previous studio album Graduation (2007).
However, he too denounced the rappers as generally overconfident, concluding that "one-upmanship [gave] way to self-assured competence and Khaled-inspired complacence", although he complimented T.I.