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Why Cliquishness is Harming UK Battle Rap

July 1, 2012
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By David “The Mast” Masters

Society, by its very nature, is about group behaviour. The idea that we all have to work together for the better of everyone is as old as societies themselves.  We all have our own sub-groups in which we move, and associate ourselves with people we like or need to know.

I’ve never been one for bias, in any situation. So, though I love the people who I would consider my own, I will never give preferential treatment where it counts. It isn’t productive, really. How good someone is at any given task is not determined by how much you like them, and this is an idea that people seriously need to understand in the British battle rapping community.

I constantly see people retweeting their friends battles, which is fine. Rarely will you see someone take an unfavourable stance on their friends’ battles, though. There is more Twitter beef or interaction than there are actual battles nowadays, and people let this cloud their vision of how good or bad someone can be. Callumboom’s legendarily dreadful performance against Impact was met with almost universal scorn on the Don’t Flop Facebook,  but he had an army of never-before-seen friends cheering him on and defending him. It’s no good for the community. We need more genuine fans of the craft than the people performing the craft.

There’s a lot of people in the Don’t Flop scene who have each other’s backs to the point of grand bias, and it’s never anything short of cringeworthy seeing them comment on battles (If you think this is about you, you’re guilty of something whether I meant you or not).  As for me? I wouldn’t give two shakes of a duck’s tail. I don’t care if my own flesh and blood steps in the ring, personally. If you’re not good, you’re not good. Quality control is something Don’t Flop seem to be cracking down on, and it’s about time, but we’re going to get nowhere if preferential treatment remains as ripe as it does.

You run the risk of alienating those wanting to join by making it seem like a club of mates. It’s not and it can’t afford to be. There needs to be a line drawn. Some people do not care to join in on all of the non-battle insults and banter, and that needs to be respected.

Another kind of bias is way more serious, and cliquey on a national scale.

Don’t Flop would not exist were it not for Americans and nor would hip hop. I am genuinely worried by the overwhelming amount of anti-Americanism that comes from the fans and the MCs.  “Let’s show them Yanks a thing or two.” The crowd for Illmaculate vs. Tony D was so disgustingly biased that you could almost taste it in the air. This is a grand shame, because the battle was phenomenal. It was as though people had already decided to cheer one man more because he came out of a vagina in this country. That needs to stop, fast. If it doesn’t, the league runs the risk of not attracting certain big American battlers.

Whether it’s nationalistic bias or one based on friendship, you seriously need to knock it off and pay attention to the bars. I don’t care how much you like someone. JUDGE FAIRLY.

I support quality. I don’t look at passports.

If you make great music, I’ll buy it. If you’re a good battler, I’ll support you. What I will not do is treat you like you’re fam if you’re not. I don’t particularly care if you’re a Londoner or not. Be good.

This league’s MCs, and indeed the country’s, are learning to rely on location bias. “YES! HE’S FROM WHERE I AM!” Who cares?

DNA vs. Eurgh was an incredible battle on BOTH counts. It was remarkably close. However, try finding a comment that doesn’t involve saying, “UK REPRESENT! DFAFD.!” and I will concede. Who cares where anyone’s from? It’s not war, people.

Talent should always prevail, not nepotism.

Things need to change or I sincerely fear for the future of this country’s battle scene.

@TheMastTweets

The Dreaded Rap Battle Choke

May 30, 2012
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By David “The Mast” Masters

What IS a choke? A choke is not a stumble and it’s important to tell the difference. Whilst the line does become blurry at some points,  chokes are generally  very different and very noticeable. In fact, they can also be very damaging.

A choke, for those with such boring lives as to not know what rap battles are, is when the participant forgets his or her rhymes and is forced to either freestyle, move onto their next part or just pass on the round. It’s generally considered fatal in almost all cases, with rare exception. Some people have minor chokes that are overcome, but generally they’re seen to be somewhat insurmountable.

A stumble, to me, is when someone clearly knows their part, but trips over their words a bit. This is nowhere near as serious, but can cause an unfavourable judgement if they occur too frequently.

How do you judge these events? There is no one answer. Some believe a choke loses a battle, some believe a choke loses a round, but some believe that you can win with multiple chokes. Here are some examples and how I judge them:

Porich vs. Soul Khan

Soul Khan has a noticeable lapse in memory during is second round, which seems to only be made worse when he forces himself to recite some of his other bars. Granted, he finishes his round, but it was a pretty large choke for someone like him.

In his second, Porich says, “Your obsession with short, black men’s a scary omen, guy. Hey, where were you the that night Gary Coleman died?” Capping off his third, he compliments Soul Khan rather sarcastically regarding the choke. Soul Khan, not to be outdone, brought forth the rebuttal, “Motherfucker, I could beat you if I did or didn’t choke. Where was I on the night Gary Coleman died? Giving your mum a different stroke.”

This is one of the more layered and effective rebuttals of all time. Why? He took note of his choke, and the fact that Rich made fun of it, and included it in the rebuttal. That indicates freestyling ability. He also replied to Rich’s S.O.N.S./Gary Coleman line, too. He cancelled out the choke, while also hitting Rich with a rebuttal, taking weight and damage out of both. It stood fresh in everyone’s minds and made Rich look bad. That is the very definition of a flip. He literally flipped the situation on its head by hitting every point needed.

Should he have lost based on that choke? The round? Possibly. The match? No, because he rectified it. This ties into the placement of chokes. Had Khan choked in his third, anyone who gave Rich any of the first two would have likely given it to Rich, simply because he wouldn’t have been able to perform the flip. Soul Khan went first, so his third round could flip the material in Rich’s second, but it would’ve been impossible to rebuttal anything in Rich’s third as that was the final verse.

As long as you have the ability to freestyle well or, at least, perform a really on-point rebuttal, you will always have a shot are recovering from chokes. Unless you do what happened in this next battle.

Disciple vs. Dose

Dose was undefeated (undeservedly so, but we won’t go there) when he headed into his first international battle at Don’t Flop’s To the Test 10 against Disciple. Many had the rounds to be very even, and they were, right up until the third round. Dose unfortunately forgot all of his third round, and as a result, it cost him the match.

I believe a full round choke IS an automatic loss, and I think anyone else should agree.

Lefty vs. Double L

At Don’t Flop’s ‘The Hunger For More’, Double L had a third round choke that was identical to Dose’s. The difference is that many had given Double L the first two rounds before he chokes. Do you give him the benefit of the doubt, or do you count the whole round choke as a loss?

Again, I believe it’s a total loss, but as you can see, there are multiple points of contention, however fruitless.

The Saurus vs. Pat Stay

This one is also met with contention. Pat, after winning the first (in my opinion) and looking to be taking the second, suffered a choke mid-round. He made the excuse that he wrote his “shit” the night before, but that doesn’t wash with me. He should know better. The material he claims he forgot, which he rapped in the post-match interview, was dynamite and would’ve have bagged him the round, I think. So, it’s very unfortunate.

However, lots of people feel he won the first and the third, even without rebuttaling the choke. Saurus had a monster rebuttal in his third (having gone second), but didn’t really have much else (I felt it was his weakest round),  and thus people apply the rebuttal to Saurus trouncing Pat’s second as opposed to winning the third.

I personally feel Pat won the first, lost the second due to the gravity of the choke, and the third is honestly so close to call based on the factors. Pat’s third was amazing, but it’s a case of Pat’s third vs. the HUGE rebuttal in an otherwise sub-par round from Saurus in his third. Then you factor in that Pat didn’t rebuttal the choke, either. Had he, I think I’d have gone with Pat. I maintain that the third was Saurus’s by the thinnest of hairs possible, but this is a prime example of how chokes aren’t always easy to work into a judgement.

Deffinition vs. Jefferson Price

This one, also at ‘To The Test 10′, that comes under a lot of fire.

Deffinition won, many claim, due to Jefferson Price’s choke in the third. He finished his round, but it was large enough for him to stop rhyming and comedically say, “You said this would happen!” to Deffinition. He handled it with class, even through the frustration, but I do feel it cost him the match.

I don’t think this was Deff’s best at ALL, and I’m sure he doesn’t either. I believe Deff took the first with a degree of safety, Jeff took the second with a larger degree of comfort, but the third wasn’t working out. I’m of the school of thought that if you choke, you lose the round.

Many claim that because Jeff’s first two were very good, and he finished his third despite the choke, that he should’ve won. That only works if you give Jeff the first two. I do not feel you can say Jeff deserves the L based on his third round choke, at all. I believe he lost that round and, due to Deff taking the first, lost the match as a result. That adds to two rounds to one in favour of Deffinition.

I don’t believe his choke definitely means he lost, but I do believe it’s madness to claim someone can win a round they choked in.

O’Shea vs. Sensa

This battle is one that I will never understand.

I have a great love for what O’Shea has done for Don’t Flop and he is easily one of the more entertaining guys to watch. If you go back and watch his battles with Loe Pesci, Dirtbag Dan, Lego, and Flex Digits (his best performance in my opinion), you will see he was the inarguable king of jokes/bars in unison. He had both to a high enough degree that there were few people he couldn’t beat, I feel. In this battle, the first ever Don’t Flop title match, O’Shea had stumbles throughout every single round, and choked a few times in addition to that.

I don’t believe there’s any justifiable reason for him winning that match. I don’t say that as a hater, because I am a fan of O’Shea and will remain so until given reason to feel otherwise. I say it because he faced off against Sensa. The importance of the match, the calibre of opponent and the fact that Sensa never choked is what baffles me about all of it. People say Sensa’s angles never hit home, but that’s irrelevant. O’Shea choked and stumbled his way through the match.

He choked in his battle with Ness Lee at Blood in the Water 5, too. It’s a growing problem of which Don’t Flop’s current champion is blatantly aware.

Everyone judges chokes differently, but I feel there are criteria in place enough to make it so that the decision isn’t a hard one. Once in a while you get a battle like The Saurus vs. Pat Stay, where it is very odd to judge because of the choke. Then, maybe you’ll get a battle like Porich vs. Soul Khan, in which the choke is made to not matter in the slightest.

It IS a big element of battling, but one that isn’t often discussed with any level of interest or equanimity. That’s all I wanted to do here, really.

Thanks to everyone who took the time to read this article, and the one before it (which got 2,000 hits in a day!). It’s much appreciated and, honestly, it’s a pleas….wait…it’s a pleasure to….ahh….FUCK!

@TheMastTweets

In the Absence of Champions

May 23, 2012
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By David “The Mast” Masters

People say that competition isn’t about the winning, it’s about the taking part. As admirable a sentiment as that is, and as true as it may be in some cases, it doesn’t always apply. You win something because, usually, you were the best person competing, and you miss out on winning because you weren’t good enough to take the prized spot.

Every competitive sport is like this. Winning counts. Winning MATTERS.

I’ve always said battle rapping qualifies as a sport, because it does, and anyone who says it doesn’t is wrong. Sure, they aren’t athletes, so maybe it’s not a TRUE sport, but it is a competitive medium. Throughout the 90s and into 2000s, battles evolved from just being on stage and playfully mocking the opponent with verse,  or rocking a crowd (Busy Bee Vs Kool Moe Dee, for example), and became something else entirely. The plight of the MC was vastly stepped up as the craft of MCing became a talent all its own.

In 1996, Nick Accurso and Jason Brunson founded Scribble Jam, America’ largest hip hop festival. It featured everything from live music, breakdancing, DJ sets and MC battles.  It went from strength-to-strength, as everything in the battling scene seems to, and all of a sudden Scribble Jam had traded parking lots for known venues packed out with as many as 20,000 plus fans.

What IS Scribble Jam and why were the battles so important though?

Scribble Jam was survival of the fittest. Scribble Jam was an all-freestyle tournament where you would battle many MCs per day, with zero preparation, on beat. Everything had to be recited off-the-top, or at the very least recited from memory. Rebuttals were the currency during these times. They hit hard enough in written battle leagues of today, but back then, rebuttals were truly a ten to a penny. Anyone who won Scribble Jam almost inarguably deserved it, off the back of the sheer skill it takes to battle that way. When you saw Eyedea, Adeem, The Saurus (Twice), Illmaculate or Nocando crowned as king, you KNOW they won for a reason. You know they had the right to stand up and say, “I do this. This is my area. Get at me.”

Then came the W.R.C. (World Rap Championships), courtesy of Jump-Off. The W.R.C. was a monumental worldwide 2-on-2 tournament that yielded reward of $40,000 each for the winners. The Saurus/Illmaculate, again, won this twice with an unprecedented and, some say, unmatched display of freestyle and written lyricism on top of an ability to cater to each opponent. You won because you were the best. All of the league owners you see, for the most part, plied their craft in the W.R.C. tournaments. Eurgh of Don’t Flop, Organik of King of the Dot? They both started as freestyle MCs, and truly amazing ones at that.

These leagues eventually folded and/or went bankrupt, leaving a hole that sorely needed to be filled.

Like a phoenix from the ashes, we finally received organisations like The Elements League (Canada) and Grind Time (America). These were written battle leagues in which you are told of your opponent and given time to write bars before the event your battle is held out. This added an ENTIRELY new dynamic to the artform. Lyricism became harder hitting and way more relevant due to the ability of being able to write specifically for an opponent. Freestyle rebuttals became more noticeable and effective, too. Especially due to the fact that certain written MCs couldn’t, and still cannot, rebuttal.

It takes a grand amount of skill, bravery and talent to be good and come out a winner, but with promo (No win/loss) battles becoming more popular, crowning true winners seems to be a legitimately dying concept. Can any of these modern day battlers claim greatness over ALL time, or just their era? King of the Dot hosts a Grand Prix in which the winner gets a title shot, and that is written, too. It is a great competition and provides a much needed injection of MCs taking their bars seriously.

Just how much are we missing Scribble or the W.R.C., though? Much is said of The Saurus and Illmac’s legacies (I think Illmac is the best ever due to his top tier domination of both eras), and deservedly so, but would they still be bringing home championships today? Maybe they would be twelve time W.R.C. champs. Maybe Saurus would never win another Scribble, or win four more. Who can say? Nobody, and I do think that is the problem.

If I ever won the lotto, I would put up 10 grand and invite MCs to come perform in a Scribble type tournament. Not only would it force people to really measure their skills in an environment where winning matters, but it would open this generation to an entirely different aspect of battling.

I prefer written to freestyled battles; the content is cleaner and the material is generally much better. The only reason it’s so good now is because of what came before, though.

With that said, The Saurus vs. Justice from Scribble Jam 2006 is the absolute pinnacle of freestyle battles.


“Your name’s The Saurus, but your face is more like the asteroid that killed you.”
“This is America, bitch. Here, Justice is served.”

Amazing. Just amazing.

I don’t know how close we are to ever having something like this again, or ever, but I feel that today’s MCs are missing the chance to hone their craft in an area of battling that matters SO much…but seems to be dying out. I feel that any MC who hasn’t earned their stripes in those kinds of battles will never be a complete battler.

Bring back the freestyle tournament. To those of you who MC in written leagues, I beg you to step your freestyle games up. You’ll win a lot more battles. Trust me.

Can you imagine a Scribble Jam or a W.R.C. with the likes of Nils in it? Tenchoo/Lego as a W.R.C. team? These are the things we’re missing, and I think that is damned tragic.

@TheMastTweets


Why the “Bars vs. Jokes” Debate is Irrelevant

April 1, 2012
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By Alex Bartiromo

Ever since the modern form of a cappella, written battle rap has become popular, there has been one vital question that battlers and fans alike have posed time and time again: What is more important, making the crowd laugh or making them “ooh” and “aah” in respect? More simply put: jokes over bars? Back when battle rap was all freestyle, this debate seemed to matter less; any insult that got a reaction from the crowd was a positive. But as the scene has evolved and become more thought-out and complex, this question has become a serious matter in the battle rap community. Many judges have bemoaned the fact that battles seem to have become stand-up comedy events, but some key figures in the community have proclaimed that the main purpose of these events is to have fun, with Skirmish of Rhyme Asylum bluntly asserting, “jokes over bars” at a 2011 Don’t Flop event. In my opinion, this debate is irrelevant and detracts from the more important question of the quality of the content.

Now, to many I must seem to be over-analyzing this. I understand that for most rappers, battle rap events are to promote themselves a bit and have a good time. But, as someone who has watched many a battle in my time, this is what I like to do. I do also believe that looking at battles critically can improve the overall quality of them.

The reason I think that the “bars or jokes” argument is worthless is because I think that it i is being looked at from the wrong plane of thought. Rather than judging the seriousness of the content, I would rather examine the effectiveness and specificity. This effectively pivots the debate from “bars vs. jokes” to “generic vs. personal”. Now, when I say “personal”, I don’t necessarily mean it in the “true story” sense (although this definitely counts as a kind of personal bar), where one battler attempts to expose hidden or damning facts about the other battler’s life to make them look bad. When I talk about a personal bar, I mean a bar that only applies to the person it is being said to. For example, calling O’Shea fat is not personal, because there are other fat people in the battle rap scene. However, mentioning his job at Morrisons or his Everton fandom is personal because it could not be used against anyone else in the battle community (and few people in the world). YouTube user UgoStrange breaks this down wonderfully in his video on the same topic.

“Personal” bars are not always better; the best battlers are the ones who know what the situation calls for. For example, the aforementioned O’Shea is a master at using irrelevant and generic jokes to his advantage. When he wins a battle, much of the time, it is because he has essentially convinced the crowd that he is a more likeable person. In his recent Don’t Flop title match versus Sensa, he came with solid personals (an underrated aspect of his battling), but arguably the most effective parts of his verses were the jokes. This is because Sensa is an expert when it comes to personals (although I thought he was slightly off base in the angles he took here), but has always struggled to present himself as someone who could laugh at himself or be particularly funny at all (although his recent 2v2 battle proves me wrong, but at this point in time, the statement was true). Therefore, O’Shea was doing something that he could not, making him look superior in the battle. Sensa tried to rebut this concept in his third round when he said, “It’s not hard to make ‘em laugh bruv”. No, perhaps not (especially not that crowd). But done correctly, it can still be highly effective.

However, most battlers are not able to use those kinds of generic bars so effectively (which is a testament to O’Shea’s personality and charisma), and the ones that rely on them too much end up sounding trite and boring. This has become a problem with Charron over the past year, who has lifted jokes more than a few times from easy-to-find internet sites and stand-up comedy sketches, as Cruger eloquently pointed out in their battle at World Domination 2. He is just one example (and to be fair, he manages to pull it off decently), though, of a trend in battle rap that makes certain events seem like little more than Yo Momma with Wilmer Valderrama.

Which is not to say that battle rap events should be completely serious and devoid of fun either. I find it difficult to watch URL battles simply because everyone in the venue takes themselves so seriously and just try to prove that their opponents are “pussies” or “fags” without being able to laugh at themselves. This is a shame, because the battlers there are so clearly talented (the quality control is probably better than any other battle rap league in the world), and the events are so well put together. I do like a heated battle, but a verbal fight just to see who can rattle off more supposedly genuine gun bars is not appealing to me (and the whole idea of “fake personals” is another article altogether).

That is why the best battlers know when to use both serious bars and jokes while still keeping it personal. Look at TheSaurus, who has been a top-tier battler for nearly ten years now. In his most recent battle against Pat Stay, he walked this tightrope beautifully, using keeping all of his material focused on his opponent while still displaying his deft wordplay and impressive structure. In round one he rapped, “stop telling us you’re ‘sucka free’ and tell us what the fuck it means,” and then going on to display a series of stories to show that Pat Stay’s signature catchphrase may, in fact, be inaccurate. Later on in the battle, he was able to be just as effective using jokes. In round two, he said, “But wait y’all, Pat’s a boss/ Just look how fast he puts out those faggot blogs crying after every match he lost,” and then went for the jugular with, “So talk about my kid or my dad/ Or any chick from my past/ If I cared what your angles were, I’d call Bishop and ask,” citing the now infamous beef between Pat Stay and Bishop Brigante over bars that the latter purportedly gave to Marvwon before his battle with Stay. As you can see, TheSaurus was able to use both jokes and serious bars just as effectively, since they were both unique to his opponent. This recognition is a great part of how he has managed to be such an excellent battler for so long (funnily enough, it is a lack of this recognition that has kept Pat Stay from ever being truly top-tier).

Without giving my thoughts about everything in the battle scene, I think that by talking about “jokes vs. bars”, people are missing the point. They are both just as effective if the battler knows how to use them properly, and the battler uses them properly when he/she is able to single out his/her opponent with a rap that applies to nobody, or almost nobody, else. Of course, depending on how good the battler is at they, he/she can also mix in some generic bars to display their lyricism or to endear themselves to the audience, but the battlers that rely on them, with a few exceptions, end up being average at best and indistinguishable from any of the horde of jokers who happen to rhyme.

MA – First Class (Mixtape Review)

August 6, 2011
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Click here to download First Class for free.

20-year-old Sudanese-British emcee MA will probably be unfamiliar to you if you’re not in-tune with the battle scene. A veteran of the 2007 JumpOff 2-on-2 World Rap Championships, MA has substantial pedigree in this arena and can boast freestyle punchline abilities beyond that of most emcees. Further establishing his supremacy this year upon battling former WRC partner Click in one of the most consummate performances I’ve ever seen in Don’t Flop battle, MA is now out to prove his worth as a full-fledged musician and recording artist with the release of his second mixtape, First Class.

Originally from Oxford, but currently based out of Cambridge, the MA moniker seems congruent with his choice of Britain’s two most famous university cities as his twin hometowns. Fittingly, the young rhymer is all about the words, the craft, and seemingly less concerned with the superficialities, the image and the need to pander to an industy of cool. With a maturity beyond his years, MA weighs strong lyrically and proves has his head screwed on – and though he clearly knows hip-hop, he’s equally comfortable ditching any adherence to purism by occasionally spitting over a pop and r’n'b instrumentals, and by forgoing the punchlines and the putting a dip in the intricate rhyme schemes from time to time in order to spin a more fluid narrative.

The most striking thing about First Class is that there’s great deal of commonsense and honesty exuding from it – and with it, MA’s amenable personality and a self-effacing sense of humour shine through. He isn’t in the least bit pretentious, and he seems unfazed by a need to impress by finding semblance in any street hip-hop purism; he opts instead for lucid, down-to-earth and relatable themes, and explores them with independent-mindedness. For example in “Politickin’”, the mixtape’s stand-out track,  he expounds upon the hypocrisy of so-called “conscious rappers” and the delusional nature of self-proclaimed hip-hop role models. It’s a theme as yet uncommonly explored in the underground hip-hop domain, and thus shows an open-mindedness in a genre full of rappers “citing crazy guys like David Icke.” and “wearing Palestine scarves, but completely forgetting about the Palestine part.” Another highlight is “Scramble for Africa”, a narrative in which he distils a righteous sense of anger predicated on European colonialism and exploitation of the great continent and its people, all the while showing a good grasp of historical facts, and citing, among other things, mining magnate Cecil Rhodes and the naming of Zimbabwe as Rhodesia.

There are some nice token gestures in the mixtape too, one of them being the inclusion of a live show recording at a Cambridge gig where MA performs with a live band covering Alicia Key’s “Empire State of Mind”. Proving he can rock a live show, the battle emcee puts in a vibrant, entertaining performance with crowd-pleasing interation complete with lyrical shout outs to Kings College.

First Class is by no means an earth-shattering release, and nor does it display great creative musical impetus; that said, it serves its purpose as a somewhat grab-bag mixtape release, and will no doubt please fans of straight, no holds-barred emceeing. Not massively re-listenable, but totally commendable nonetheless.

www.MtotheA.com

Check out MA’s battle with former WRC partner Click. Hosted by Don’t Flop.

Don’t Flop – The UK’s Official Battle Rap League

May 31, 2011
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I wrote this feature last year for Rhythm Circus, essentially to provide people who are not necessarily in tune to hip-hop, with a bit of background info on battle rap and specifically the Don’t Flop battle league here in the UK.

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Despite considerable spotlight being thrown on the art form in Eminem’s rather underwhelming cinematic debut 8 Mile, battle rap (essentially verbal sparring in rhyme form) remains one of the least explored domains in the hip-hop world. In fact, even many seasoned hip-hop vets can only boast a hazy knowledge of battle rap history, which has seen a steady evolution over the past few years. From being a predominately freestyle-based sport performed on stage at such tournaments as Scribble Jam (essentially hip-hop’s Woodstock), its scope was expanded by the introduction of 2-on-2 tag-team battling championships and has advanced further still to its present-day incarnation as a written, a cappella format, requiring competitors to prepare and memorize entire verses weeks or even months before the battle. Enter Don’t Flop: the UK’s one-stop-shop for battle rap in its latter-day form.

Don’t Flop, the UK’s premier battle rap league is the brainchild of Rowan Faife, a.k.a. Eurgh, a battle MC who reached the semi-finals of the 2007 World Rap Championship in New York, and his close friend Freddie Scott-Miller, himself a talented battle MC who goes by the name of Cruger. When battle rap looked as though it might just have died a death after urban entertainment company Jumpoff, who essentially ran the battle scene from 2005-2007 disbanded all its battle rap operations claiming the art-form appeals only to a niche market, battle emcees decided to take matters into their own hands by creating their own leagues independent of corporate backing. Grind Time was founded in America soon to be followed by King of the Dot in Canada and it is then that Rowan and Freddie saw a necessity to fill the gaping void here in the UK. A renaissance began and as UK hip-hop boasts many veterans of the battle scene and some of the best freestylers (i.e. those MC’s able to improvise their rhyme schemes and punchlines) in the world, it seemed sacrilege to the art form to simply let their talents go by the wayside. Don’t Flop was founded as a “written battle league” whereby competitors are made aware of their opponents weeks or even months in advance to allow sufficient time to craft elaborate, hard-hitting verses.

Oshea eliciting frenzied laughter from the Don't Flop crowd.

The rationale here is that when MC’s are allowed more time to prepare, the content in battles will subsequently improve thus improving their entertainment value.Moreover, written battle leagues can encourage a greater number of MC’s to participate, i.e. MC’s who may be good writers but can’t necessarily freestyle well enough to hold their own in an impromptu battling set-up. That said, if executed judiciously, improvised or premeditated rebuttals and freestyles will often score top marks when mixed in seamlessly with written verses.

Being a grassroots movement and founded by and for battle MC’s, the league has great strength in unity by those who look not for any great financial gain but who are passionate about maintaining and strengthening the status of the art-form as well using the exposure they get on Youtube (see. http://www.youtube.com/dontflop) as a means of increasing their fanbase.The battle rap community is a close-nit network of like-minded individuals who champion the art of sublime, creative lyricism over anything else. Hip-hop heads can instantly recognize the merit in how battle emcees implement all the technical aspects of rapping through complex multisyllabic rhyme-schemes and structured cadences, with the overall intent of degrading their opponent in the cleverest way possible. To the casual spectator, this can just seem like a frenzy of abusive insults being hurled back and forth but scratch away this caustic veneer and you discover battle rap to be a consortium of talented wordsmiths.

The vitriol opponents have for one another is reserved almost entirely for battles, and MC’s will rarely ever come to blows over what’s quoted in an opponent’s verse. Indeed, for all the outrageous racist quips and eye-watering character assassinations in battles, the battle rap community is itself inclusive and diverse, with people from all walks of life of various creeds, colours and social backgrounds. From a buck-toothed Scouser called Oshea, one of the league’s most prolific emcees, to Sensa, an uncompromising, stern-faced emcee from Norwich, Don’t Flop is an aesthetically motley collective of individuals but is far from gimmicky – it is a serious investment of time and effort by all those involved and being a competitor in the league requires a lot of skill, preparation and credibility. Anyone coming ill-prepared or with woefully generic disses risks being relegated to the lowest tiers of the division. On the flipside, the kudos gained from proving yourself as a worthy opponent is immeasurable.

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Tenchoo – Scary Movie (Album Review)

May 21, 2011
Reviews
2 Comments

For those of you who don’t know about Tenchoo by now, I suggest you set aside a couple of hours or so (but ideally an afternoon) to get acquainted with his battles on Don’t Flop. A big personality with a remarkably poised delivery as well as an awesome ability to mix impromptu rebuttals and freestyles in with his equally hard-hitting, relevant and intricately crafted written verses, Tenchoo might just be THE battler to beat in the UK right now (though I can’t help but wonder if the true test of his supremacy would be for him battle the equally beloved battle extraordinaire known as Oshea out of Liverpool — but who knows). Furthermore, the positive exposure provided by these battles (which have garnered over 100,000 views in total) has proved an invaluable means of promoting an album for which many Tenchoo fans, both old and new, have been kept waiting a fair amount of time for. Well, after months of anticipation here it is: it’s called Scary Movie, it’s 16 tracks long, it’s available for just a fiver and rest assured, you’ll find it’s every bit as dope as you hoped for.

Originally out of South Norwood, London, Tenchoo arrived on the South Coast as a teenager only to find himself in a place devoid of a serious music scene, and one dominated by and large by generic house and garage styles. Indeed, one of the album’s most resonant and pertinent themes is the cultural and geographical isolation he, and no doubt many other hip-hop artists and enthusiasts like him in the UK experience: i.e. those who are often dispersed throughout the country and lack a real centre to gravitate towards. In ‘Barrel Crabs’ for example, he describes being confined to what he describes as “cliquey hip-hop venues” to get his name out there, as well as having to tackle what he calls the “small-town syndrome” of Pompey inhabitants who, are generally unwilling to expand their musical horizons to the likes of Tenchoo’s brand of lyrical, hardcore hip-hop.

An obvious trap of the so-called lyrical emcees — and one I was worried Tenchoo might fall into prior to listening to Scary Movie — is to stick to the same trite lyrical patterns with an abject lack of creativity and diversity of subject matter; however, thematically the album is extremely well varied — runnning the gamut from extremely down-to-earth ruminations on life, right the way through to compelling fictional first-person narratives of pre-apocalyptic doom and chaos. He also proves himself an able storyteller, a talented wordsmith and most importantly, a beastly rhymer — his convoluted, densely packed verses and polysyllabic rhyme schemes displaying obvious shades of Canibus, along with a smattering of various other heavy-hitting, afrocentric Golden age artists. Thankfully, Tenchoo doesn’t display the same greater-than-thou mentality of his chief role model, and perhaps the most charming thing about him as a rapper is his modesty and his realistic outlook on life, despite some amazing lyrical outbursts: I’m the only author, who survived vampire bites intoxicating my veins with holy water. Played off against the ultra-lyrical stanzas, are his stories of street life which stay rooted in the gritty and the realistic: ‘Staying Positive’ for example, is an edgy, poetic tale loaded with evocative similies and metaphors, about the potential pitfalls of street life and of falling foul of this delusional “ghetto mentality”. In addition, there is a warranted inclusion of some excellent skits including a tongue-in-cheek dialogue featuring Nick Bright (Tenchoo’s brother and an upcoming radio presenter on BBC’s 1Xtra) with a Portsmouth local with whom he discusses his misgivings and overall apprehension towards Tenchoo’s style and how ill-fitting it is in the local scene (as per the theme Tenchoo discusses in previous tracks). There’s also a friendly nod to fellow 2-on-2 battle partner Lego out of York in “North South Connect” in which the two spit some sick a cappella verses outside one of the battling events.

Technically, Tenchoo’s flow and cadence are slick and powerful, though at times teetering on the predictable, until he switches it up on ‘Extreme Power’ — his impressive ebbing-and-flowing staccato delivery contriving to make this one of the album’s stand-out tracks. Teaming up with Pompey beatmaker Haji of Haji’s Yard, the album has an honest old-school vibe bolstered by sturdy production values despite working to a limited independent budget and despite the absence of high-end studio techniques. In fact, it rarely fails to live up to expectations, with the production and overall soundscape not merely complimenting Tenchoo’s lyrics but also having been tailored to befit the character and to heighten the meaning of each track. The combination of dark, ominous samples mixed with traditional boom-baps mesh perfectly with Tenchoo’s battle raps and his impressive vocabulary.

Overall, it’s a seriously hard-hitting album with an irresistably simple yet effective combination of banging beats and hard-hitting rhymes sure to satisfy the musical cravings of any hip-hop head. To all intents and purposes, Scary Movie is testament to the worthy ascent of one of the UK’s most exciting underground rap prospects.

Buy Scary Movie now for just £5 @http://firstson.bandcamp.com

Old track from Tenchoo. Produced by 2late.

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