Kendrick Lamar performs in New York City.
The other day, Kendrick Lamar took his guest verse on
Big Sean's "Control" as an opportunity to casually invite all his
friends to fight to the death: "I'm usually homeboys with the same
n***as I'm rhymin' with / But this is hip-hop and them n***as should
know what time it is / And that goes for Jermaine Cole, Big KRIT, Wale
/ Pusha T, Meek Millz, A$AP Rocky, Drake / Big Sean, Jay Electron',
Tyler, Mac Miller / I got love for you all but I'm tryna murder you
n***as / Tryna make sure your core fans never heard of you n***as / They
dont wanna hear not one more noun or verb from you n***as . . ."
Kendrick's verse is technically more of a healthy competitive
challenge between friends than an actual threat. But it got us thinking
about the greatest rap beefs ever, from the deeply silly to the
all-too-serious. Here's our definitive countdown:
10. Eminem vs. The Source
Eminem
Peter Pakvis/Redferns
How could something so one-sided be so enjoyable? Benzino, a two-bit
Boston rapper-slash-editor, somehow held a lot of influence at The Source magazine. In 1999, he promoted his group's Made Men
album with full-page ads in the magazine and a rave review. Conflict of
interest alert! Benzino made things even worse for himself when he
attacked Eminem on dubious racial grounds. Em came down on him like a
combat boot on an ant with "Nail in the Coffin" and "The Sauce," where
he chuckled while imagining Benzino being held out of a window. The beef
continued for a while after that, but in the end Benzino was a total
laughingstock and Eminem was still Eminem.
9. The Real Roxanne vs. Roxanne Shante
The Roxanne Wars – a never-ending series of battle records in the
mid-1980s – started when the rap group UTFO didn't show up to a radio
event. They'd gotten popular off their song "Roxanne, Roxanne," about a
(fictional) girl who doesn't answer their phone calls. Their no-show
prompted 14-year-old Lolita Shanté Gooden to fight back on the fake
girl's behalf, adopting the name Roxanne Shanté. Her fierce and foul
response song, "Roxanne's Revenge," quickly sold 250,000 copies. UTFO
got another girl (and another one after her) to play the role of "The
Real Roxanne" and take shots back at Shanté. Other voices soon joined
in; anywhere from 30 to 100 responses were ultimately recorded.
8. 50 Cent vs. Kanye West
50 Cent and Kanye West on the cover of Rolling Stone.
Albert Watson
7. Lil Kim vs. Foxy Brown
Lil' Kim, Foxy Brown.
Jim Smeal/WireImage; KMazur/WireImage
On a 1999 track by Lil Cease, Lil Kim spit a pretty hard 16 bars, not
seemingly directed at any one person. But then Puffy had to jump in and
say, "Stop trying to sound like her, bitches." Well! Foxy Brown didn't
much care for that. She opened her verse on Capone-N-Noreaga's "Bang
Bang" the same way Kim did on "Quiet Storm," saying, "Hot damn, ho, here
we go again," before calling her rival a snitch and worse. This war of
words, which has never really ended, even spilled into the streets, with
20 shots fired outside of the studios of New York radio station Hot 97.
(That's why there's an NYPD camera permanently installed on the block
now.) More recently, while Nicki Minaj and Kim traded barbs, Foxy made
appearances by Nicki's side.
6. LL Cool J vs. Canibus
LL Cool J, Canibus.
Largely thought to be one of the best lyrical battles of all time,
this began in 1997, when – on a guest verse for LL's "4, 3, 2, 1" –
Canibus rapped, "Yo L, is that a mic on your arm? Lemme borrow that." LL
has a famous microphone tattoo, but apparently no sense of humor. He
took out the offending lines, then recorded an entire verse taking shots
at Canibus: "The symbol on my arm is off limits to challengers."
Surprise! Canibus retaliated with "Second Round KO," where Canibus got
Mike Tyson to run his mouth before ripping into LL himself. (LL swung
again with "Ripper Strikes Back," among others, but the fight really
ended with "KO.")
NWA exploded onto MTV in Raiders hats and Jheri curls, flashing guns
and an attitude. They became a phenomenon, accruing a huge and
unexpected suburban audience. And yet, somehow, the money just didn't
add up. They'd signed an incredibly bad deal, with de facto leader Eazy E
and manager Jerry Heller taking much of the cut (even though Ice Cube
had written over half of the lyrics from their debut, Straight Outta Compton).
Cube walked, immediately finding success on his own. The remaining
members threw darts, calling him Benedict Arnold. After several volleys,
Cube finally returned fire with the brutal four-minute dis track "No
Vaseline": "Yella Boy's on your team, so you're losing / Ay yo Dre,
stick to producing / Calling me Arnold, but you Benedict / Eazy-E saw
your ass and went in it quick / You got jealous when I got my own
company / But I'm a man, and ain't nobody humping me." And that's just
before the first chorus hits. It gets worse, which is to say, it gets
better.
4. Boogie Down Productions vs. Juice Crew
This past weekend marked the 40th anniversary of hip-hop's birth, at a
block party thrown by DJ Kool Herc up in the Bronx. Back in 1985,
though, things weren't so crystal clear. The Queens-based Juice Crew
released "The Bridge" – which KRS-One and his Bronx-born crew, Boogie
Down Productions, understood to mean that hip-hop started in Queens.
Unacceptable! Thus began a rat-a-tat assault over the Throggs Neck:
"South Bronx" from BDP, "Kill That Noise" from Juice Crew's MC Shan.
Finally came BDP's "The Bridge is Over," largely acknowledged as one of
the best career-enders ever. This beef, for once, has a nice ending: In
2007, KRS-One and Juice Crew's Marley Marl united for the song "Hip Hop
Lives."
3. 2Pac vs. Biggie
Tupac Shakur, Notorius B.I.G.
The most notable beef is also the saddest. It's the one that went too
far, and that means there's no way it could be the best. Biggie and
2Pac started out as friends, but rumors and media commotion ruined a
good thing. In 1994, 2Pac got shot while leaving New York's Quad
Studios; he alleged Puffy and Biggie set him up. (It didn't help that
Big put out "Who Shot Ya?" shortly after.) Pac pieced the puzzle
together in his mind with "Hit Em Up," where he opened up the song with
the lines, "I ain't got no motherfucking friends / That's why I fucked
your bitch, you fat motherfucker." At the Source Awards in 1995, Death
Row's Suge Knight stood onstage and berated Puffy as a dancing,
camera-hogging wannabe. Things escalated quickly: Magazines called it an
"East Coast vs. West Coast" war, without thought of what consequences
could come of that. Tupac was gunned down in 1996, and Biggie, six
months later. Both murders remain unsolved.
50 Cent, Ja Rule.
How quickly things come crashing down. Ja Rule was on top of the
world in the late 1990s, his thug-n-B tunes running radio. As lore goes,
the trouble started when 50 tried to steal Ja's jewelry; or maybe it
was because he got turned away at a video shoot. Regardless, 50 ended up
getting stabbed at New York's club Hit Factory. And so 50 set to
dismantling Ja's career, starting with mixtape tracks ("Life's on the
Line," "I Smell Pussy") and skits ("Ja Rule Duets," where he mimics Ja's
gravel-voice singing over pop songs) and videos ("Wanksta"). Ja
responded in kind, with "Blood in My Eye" and others, though his
responses weren't nearly as effective. Ja's team left bullet holes in
50's manager's office; G-Unit ran Ja and Co. out of the 106 & Park
studios. Ja attempted to broker a peace treaty through Rev. Louis
Farrakhan to no avail, long after the fight had became exhausting. It
was too late. Ja Rule was on his way out of town. Soon after, the IRS
raided the Murder Inc. offices – the equivalent of kicking a man while
he's down.
1. Jay Z vs. Nas
Jay Z, Nas.
To think, the greatest rap beef ever was all Memphis Bleek's fault.
On 2000's "My Mind Right," he says the lines, "Your life's a lie, but
here's the truth: You ain't hype to die but you hype to shoot." Read
between the lines and the insult seemed to be directed at Nas, who
responded to both Bleek and Jay Z in subliminals on mixtape tracks. This
was taken to another level on 2001's "The Takeover," where Jay called
Nas a "lame" and dissected his entire catalog piece by piece. Nas
responded with "Ether," in which he compares the Brooklyn rapper to
Judas and a camel. This prompted Jay to respond with "Supa Ugly," where
he gleefully admitted to have been sleeping with Nas' baby's mother.
(Right then, in a Hot97 on-air segment, listeners voted "Ether" as the
winning track, and Jay apologized for having gone too far.) Now, the two
rap kings are friends, having recorded together a bunch of times after
squashing their beef in 2005 at the "I Declare War" concert in
Philadelphia.
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