No Bias. No Narratives.
Synopsis: Damn, those Philly dudes always like to keep it close. Still, while NH came hard throughout, his lines were no match for Rex’s grittier bars, schemes and slicker wordplay.
Verdict: T-Rex (W0 3-0
Favorite line: T-Rex – “I’m social-anti, I stay to myself, guns, I shot my own shadow I don’t play with myself”
Recap: First posted back in 2006, someone recently put together these 4 rounds of Murda Mook battling Philly’s Joey Jihad. And while one can argue about Mook allegedly recycling bars here or Jihad’s exceptionally rapid flow, even for a battle taking place in the mid-2000’s, where intricacy mattered little, 90% of Joey’s (“I’ll have everybody trying to hit you like the lottery!”) fall in the category of being pretty basic. To be fair, Mook also came with a plethora of pedestrian lines, but his ability to mix in some wit, fiery braggadocio lines, nice performance bars and fiery wordplay/personals throughout his 4 rounds, got him this one…easy.
Verdict: Murda Mook (W) 4-0
Favorite line: Murda Mook – “Fuck your life, lacing your Jordan’s the only time you touched the Mic [Mike]!”
Recap: After kicking a bunch of light bars and struggling a bit with his flow to get easily beat by Iron Solomon’s aggressive and stinging freestyles/rebuttals in round 1, New MC gets his freestyles together to have a better round 2. However, with the more consistently spicy Solomon still dishing a bunch of hard-hitting personals in the final round of this 2-round Scribble Jam contest, it’s a 20 for the Jewish kid.
Verdict: Iron Solomon (W) 2-0
Favorite line: Iron Solomon – “Standing there trying to look all regal, I’m 5-foot-8 and I hate tall people!”
Recap: From an Ohio Scribble Jam, for two rounds Iron Solomon freestyles a gang of witty personals to handily beat back the rapid-flowing, but mostly subpar stylings of Charlie Brown.
Verdict: Iron Solomon (W) 2-0
Favorite line: Iron Solomon – “And your eyes are swollen son, give ’em back to whatever goldfish you stole them from!”
Recap: Two-round, mid-2000’s freestyle battle between a very young Passwurdz and Jay B contains a gang of personal disses and speedy lyrical burners to get your feet wet. An energetic and close one that had Jay B doing push-ups in the middle of Passwurdz’s 2nd round, the more punch/off-the-dome lit Passwurdz takes each round here for the win.
Verdict: Passwurdz (W) 2-0
Favorite line: Passwurdz – “You look like a little white bitch that just got her hymen split!”
Recap: In what was a mostly one-sided matchup, a young, loud and aggressive Tay Roc spits nothing but mayhem and fiery boastful barbs at a gritty, but ultimately overmatched Skarr in what looks to be a local battle brought to you from Orv BornReady.
Verdict: Tay Roc (W) 2-0*
Favorite line: Tay Roc – “Slugs like teabags, they hit your mug and sink in!”
Asterisk denotes that Skarr’s 3rd round wasn’t made available in the video.
Recap: From Brainstorm Battle 2004, while not at his best, Iron Solomon still delivers enough aggressive and hard-hitting disses/freestyles/personals to handily get the win over a confident, but clearly overmatched Diabolic.
Verdict: Iron Solomon (W) 2-0
Favorite line: Iron Solomon – “I’m about to burn your brain like Kurt Cobain!”
Recap: Two rounds from Scribble Jam 2005 and Iron Solomon kills it, using both witty/stinging punchlines and quickfire freestyles to beat back a rapid, but subpar punching Nocando.
Verdict: Iron Solomon (W) 2-0
Favorite line: Iron Solomon – “This is what Kenny Kravitz would look like as a skinny faggot!”
Recap: As seen here Murda Mook’s always been nice with his handle. Breaking down adversaries, spitting fluorescent punchlines, storytelling and burying opponents with a flurry of exquisite bars, Mook’s regimen for delivering bodybags was honed at an early age on the streets of New York…just ask Weeze.
Verdict: Murda Mook (W) 2-0
Favorite line: Murda Mook – “I got an Asian bitch, Ms. Chin all I get is face”
Recap: Able to combine slices of wit to his spicy punchlines and boastful barbs over the course of 3 rounds, a gritty Michael Wayne is able to beat back a young, disrespectful and aggressive, but mostly pedestrian Tay Roc in what looks to be a local battle from Baltimore.
Verdict: Michael Wayne (W) 2-1
Favorite line: Michael Wayne – “He 16?, I got a bullet for every year in his life!”
Recap: Judged battle between Detroit’s Young Miles and Philly’s Eddie Morris sees another one of those unnecessary overtime rounds from pre-Smack battle rap days as Miles more versatile bars and gritty street vernacular clearly out-performed Morris’ repetitive bully stylings.
Verdict: Young Miles (W) 3-1
Favorite line: Young Miles – “You like the old Oprah, a big bitch and a lot of talk!”
Recap: After splitting the first couple of rounds here with Dee, an explosive, hard-hitting 3rd by Loaded Lux convinces everyone including the judges to go home.
Verdict: Loaded Lux (W) 2-1
Favorite line: Loaded Lux – “The bottom of your AC, nigga that’s the only fan base [fanbase] you’ll ever have!”
Recap: In this 2004 ‘Battle for Midwest Supremacy’ Iron Solomon easily comes out on top, the NYC battler using a bunch of belitting freestyles and piercing rebuttals/punchlines to handily beat the off-the-dome, but subpar lines from Okwerdz.
Verdict: Iron Solomon (W) 2-0
Favorite line: Iron Solomon – “I’ll take you to your own state and throw you off the Golden Gate!”
Recap: Dirtbag Dan and Passwurdz go at it for a couple of rounds, freestyling over beats and competitively dishing a bunch of spirited punches, sardonic personals, aggressive lyrical banter and in Dan’s case a spicy 2nd round rebuttal that helped him take that round after getting edged in the 1st.
Verdict: TIE
Favorite line: Passwurdz – “Your beard looks like a fat woman’s vagina hair!”
Recap: In this 3-round freestyle battle from 2004, both Passwurdz (who incredibly was in his mid-teens at the time) and The Saurus show off the ability to effectively punch and speed rap, all the while keeping their flows intact and mixing in some solid off-the-dome personals to punctuate their rhymes. A goodie when you consider the oft-middling turns of early 2000’s battle rap, an overall stronger punching The Saurus edges each round for the win.
Verdict: The Saurus (W) 3-0
Favorite line: The Saurus – “This kid barely graduated kindergarten!”
Recap: Both Loaded Lux and Cash unload with gritty and boastful (no abundance of gun bars here) rhymes in this 3-rounder that shined a light on Lux’s early battle career. Cash hangs in there during round 1 with enough spicy bars to edge the opener. But afterwards, it’s pretty much all Lux as the Harlem vet spazzes with a gang of piercing punchlines that combined with some nifty wordplay, easily gets him the latter two rounds.
Verdict: Loaded Lux (W) 2-1
Favorite line: Loaded Lux – “I learned from the elders how to keep old bread guess I was molded right!”
Recap: Damn, they sure did jump around in stage a lot back in the day. Still, despite a couple of witty barbs from his opponent Franco, a way more versatile and personal/punch-heavy Passwurdz easily takes this 2003 freestyle 2-rounder.
Verdict: Passwurdz (W) 2-0
Favorite line: Passwurdz – “Hey, I got your album for free but I still want a refund!”
Recap: Classic overtime battle between Iron Solomon and Immortal Technique that happened on the spot after Technique demanded to face the winner (Solomon) of the EOW tournament they both just participated in that day, but with Immortal feeling that he got robbed. Right off the bat, however, you knew this one was a wrap, what with the normally lyrically adept Technique struggling to maintain his flow in the OT round, that is when he wasn’t kicking a bunch of pedestrian raps in both English and Spanish. And even tho he was taking on a battle rap legend, Solomon wasn’t phased one bit. The bespectacled rapper going right at his opponent’s head with fiery diss after diss to get the crowd lit and more importantly earn the win.
Verdict: Iron Solomon (W) 1-0
Favorite line: Iron Solomon – “C’mon Technique, everything you say corny, only time you get 5 mics is in a gay orgy!”
Recap: Classic in-studio battle from 2002 between street battle rap legend Jae Millz and a young up-n-comer from the BX named Goodz (over a variety of beats) sees the latter hold his own for 4 of the 5 rounds here, edging rounds 1 and 3 with a quality assortment of boastful punches and slick/witty barbs. But the ever-ready Millz, armed with a battery pack of raps that makes him so prolific with the lines, edges this one, all the while dropping thoro punchlines with dismissive flair when he wasn’t spouting a gang of graphic/gripping schemes, gritty street semantics and stunted similes/wordplay.
Verdict: Jae Millz (W) 3-2
Favorite line: Jae Millz – “I’m like a basketball coach in love with the 2, 3 dog, you can’t take me out my zone!”
