Beef Rap

What's really good folks!  Been an overall sublime week in the world of Hip-Hop, that is until the new leaked track from Pusha T of the Clipse came out.  Now we have a new (or in some cases continued) rivalry between him and DeWayne Carter, himself (that's Lil' Wayne for those not necessarily in the know of things).  Before I get started on this rivalry, allow me to do a brief history on "beef rap".  In sports, or even in life, competition is the natural order of things.  Someone is out to prove they're the best in anything or everything, or at least better than you (don't act like you don't do it either, even if the battle is with yourself).  Hip-Hop is no different, it's a grown man sport.  Everyone wants to be the best, the champion MC if you will.  Rivalries have been around since the mid-70s when DJs would have some artists spit braggadocio rhymes over a breakbeat and would criticize the last person to have gotten on the mic.  Since then it's gotten progressively more aggressive and in some more notable and infamous cases, fatal.  A few of the earlier noted "beefs" on record were the battles between Queensbridge's first lady Roxanne Shante vs. The "Real" Roxanne/UTFO, which started ironically enough over UTFO's standout hit, "Roxanne, Roxanne" and Bronx's Boogie Down Productions (KRS-One and DJ Scott La Rock *R.I.P.*) vs. Queensbridge's MC Shan/The Juice Crew over Shan's breakout cut, "The Bridge", which then spawned BDP's ridiculous classic "South Bronx".  Although these and several others during that time frame were mainly on wax and didn't get taken out of hand, throughout time cats wanted to flex their muscles and cuts were starting to get more vicious.  Even with rivalries such as Ice Cube vs. NWA, Ice Cube vs. Common, LL Cool J vs. Ice-T/Hammer/Kool Moe Dee, and X-Clan vs. 3rd Bass, things got very ugly with the now saddening rivalry between two of the greatest in most influential emcees of our generation, 2Pac and Notorious B.I.G.  Over what was seemingly a very coincidental situation, 2Pac was robbed and shot in a recording studio that then good friend/new artist Biggie Smalls was also recording in.  Mr. Shakur was thoroughly convinced that Biggie knew who had attacked him.  From that point, the string of events set off the now notorious (no pun intended) "East Coast vs. West Coast" beef, in which rappers from the west had issues from rappers from the east, New York primarily.  The unfortunate conclusion resulted in the two greats being gunned down 6 months apart from each other.  Since then, lessons have been learned in "beef rap", however while most have remained lyrical, there have been some near sweat causers, notably the intense rivalry between known antagonist 50 Cent vs. fellow Queens rapper Ja-Rule.  The beef stemmed from supposedly a member of 50's entourage robbing Ja-Rule, then it became a snowball effect (notably 50's label Shady/Aftermath vs. Ja-Rule's label Murder Inc. alongside Boston rapper Benzino).  Plus 50 gained more enemies in time, including label-mate The Game.  Both issues have since quited, but there very nervous times in both instances. Of course one of the greatest battles kept on wax over the past decade was the phenominal battle between two iconic MCs, Jay-Z and Nas.  The feud ended amicably.  Fast forwarding to present day-rivalries like Lil' Kim vs. Nicky Minaj, Aziala Banks (don't think that's how it's spelled) vs. Iggy, both of whom are relative newcomers to the mainstream.  Which brings me to Pusha vs. Wayne.  There's apparently been a long history off-and-on between Pusha, his twin brother from the duo Clipse Malice (since becoming a born-again Christian late last year he's changed his name to No Malice and embracing the Christian side of life and hip-hop *this will be a topic upcoming soon in terms of Christian/spiritual rap*), and Wayne.  Pusha dropped a single called "Exodus 20:1", which was seen as a diss to Wayne, who recently dropped his retaliatory street single called, "Ghoulish", in which he starts "Fuck Pusha T and anyone that loves him!"  Scathing!!  Let's hope this stays on wax.  Pusha's labelmate Kid Cudi has expressed support to him, while twin brother has backed out of it, stating that "if it doesn't glorify God, he's not with it" (he might as well say he's the new Lecrae and just go the Christian MC route instead of staying secular but that's for another time).  This will be a very intriguing rivalry, but as I stated, let's hope this stays entertainment, and not make it personal. Here are the tracks, judge for yourself as to how this may go.  Until next time people.  one!