Now We Have A Battle

So, it seems as if the feud may have now become a real battle. After a summer full of accusations of shots on wax and verbal passes in interviews, we now have at least one direct hit fired by Lil Kim and one by Nicki Minaj. This has finally gotten interesting because this seemingly unnecessary squabble finally makes it to wax. If you ask why I say “seemingly unnecessary”, that would be because I truly don’t understand Kim’s animosity toward the newcomer for not paying enough homage to the queen. Everyone born before 1987 is probably aware of whom the Queen Bee is and what impact she made on Hip Hop in terms of female lyricists, style, and sexuality. After Salt-n-Pepa, she took over as being the sexy woman in charge of her destiny but what she added was a passion for high end fashion and downright raunchy topics that we couldn’t get enough of and that is what she is recognized for. I’ve provided a short essay on Lil’ Kim’s pedigree, to illustrate why I don’t understand her beef. Everyone knows who she is and anyone after that is automatically draw comparisons to her so; it is my position that there is no need to require so much praise. Nicki did a photo shoot that was very Lil’ Kim like. Hell, let’s just throw it out there, it had Queen Bee written all over it but it’s obvious that she was giving Kim a nod or maybe I missed something. Sometimes imitation is the greatest form of flattery hence - Biggie Smalls, Foxy Brown, Queen Bee. I don’t see any possible way that she and her people set up a shoot like that and didn’t know that it would draw a comparison or have Kim in mind when doing it. It’s almost like sampling a beat, it was hot so let me rock to it.
With all of the logic and history aside, let’s get down to the battle. Nicki officially fired first with Roman’s Revenge featuring Emenim which was monstrous. The production by Swizz Beatz was huge with lyrics that matched. There were a couple of lines that set the tone for the song and battle. The first was in character talking to herself saying “Nicki she just mad cause you took the spot, Word, that b—ch mad cause I took the spot? Well b—ch if you ain’t sh---in’ then get off the pot”…. and “so f-ck I look like getting back to a has-been, yeah I said it, has-been, hang it up, flat screen. These are pretty ballsy words for a new comer to speak to a veteran, but I’m not sure if tenure really means as much as people make it but I’ll get to that later. With Kim keeping the feud alive this summer and not having put any music out, it seemed as if this was going to be an absolute slaughter. That would not necessarily be the case.
Kim has come back with “Black Friday” which was released on Nicki’s self-claimed “Pink Friday”. I first heard it on Hot 97 New York and I was less than enthusiastic about the response. I felt that if Kim thought that she was sending subliminal messages in various songs, there should have been a tremendous amount of aggression shown because at that point, she had her back on the ropes. If you think of her verses on “Hello Good Morning” with Dirty Money or “Monster” with Kanye West where it’s been said they were meant for the Queen, those were two SERIOUS verses before “Roman’s Revenge” and the interview with Angie Martinez where Nicki compared the battle to “having to beat your children”. Kim’s words seemed to come of nonchalantly instead of fire which I believe that situation calls for. It seemed a bit lackluster but I wanted to hear it again so that I can be fair about things so I found the whole song on the internet. Apparently Hot 97 didn’t play the whole song and yes, it did get better. As the song went on, Queen Kim found her groove that was reminiscent to the old Kim and she took jabs at the youngster about things like being a Lil’ Kim clone and the name Minaj getting her a job. Invalid points like plastic surgery and gaining fame from sexuality were made by Kim but it was still a respectable comeback.
This is where I will go back to not letting tenure cloud my vision on a Hip Hop battles. During the Cannibus vs. LL Cool J, I was so stuck on LL being a legend and one of my favorites of all time that I wouldn’t admit that this was the one time in his career where he had decisively been defeated even though I knew deep down it was true. Alright, that was a bit dramatic and sensitive, but on real isht, Cannibus did rip LL a new one and at this point, round one or three depending on how you look at it victory goes to the challenger. Do I feel that it’s over? No. Do I think that it was total domination? No, but the Queen will have to come a bit stronger to win this one and I’m waiting to see if she will pull it off. As always fell free to comment, and TELL SOMEONE!