Rapper’s Delight Me (Funny blog from Comedy Central’s and NBC’s Dwayne Perkins)

I’m completely addicted to watching freestyle rap battles on youtube.  I’m talking hours of fun. I think rappers don’t do anything anymore unless there’s a camera pointing at them…

RAPPER:

Yo this is MC Killa Fo Life and I’m just here fishing with my dad. You know what I’m saying?  We using fly bait, ya heard!

I really suggest you go MC Battle surfing.  For one, some of the lines are incredibly clever.  But even if lyrics and razor sharp deliver are not your things, there’s so much entertainment value in the whole process… The pre and post battle rhetoric, the homeboys in the background who don’t talk or smile.  What’s a rapper without a posse?  You can’t expect the world to think you’re hot if you can’t find 5 guys on your block who think you’re hot and are willing to spend hours standing behind you menacingly.

What I love the most is the odd mixture of raw aggression with utter nonchalance and lethargy.  And the more menacing the guys behind you are, the more soft spoken and aloof you can be…that is until you start spitting*.  It’s a new brand of bravado where you’re just too good to ever sweat about anything.  I think the goal is to sound as inarticulate as possible before and after you prove how much of a wordsmith you are.  You have to say “umm” a lot and look down a lot and seem almost annoyed to even have to be addressing your competitors.  It’s also preferable to be eating while you talk or doing a Rubik’s cube or anything other than intently focusing on the subject you set up the camera to speak on.

I understand this mind set.  I used to want to be good without people seeing me practice or work.  For some reason we worship genius but we forget genius is 90% perspiration.  Genius is fostered not born.  I guess no one wants to reveal how hard they work, lest their competitors match their efforts.  I wrote this entry in 2 minutes by the way…with one hand…while eating a Hot Pocket.

*Spitting – slang term for rapping.