What's Beef?

Freelance entertainment writer Morris O' Kelly broke down the current trend in Hip Hop to start beef and let it saute for the sake of record sales. He touches on Foxy Brown's recent assault charges stemming from an unpaid manicure bill, Lil' Kim's troubles on trail, 50 and Game kissing up, to Biggie's unsolved murder. It's actually fun to read O' Kelly ripping into the beefing artists as if he himself was a battling emcee, for instance:

50 Cent and The Game kissed and made up…sort of. I’ll be completely truthful. I don’t know ‘what’ the ‘beef’ was between these two…and don’t really care. All I know is that Hip-Hop isn’t happy unless it’s unhappy. If 50 Cent is not dissing The Game, then it’s Ja Rule or Fat Joe or somebody. If I got any of the names wrong, who cares. Same song, different year. So-n-so doesn’t like So-n-so, because So-n-So dissed So-n-So on So-n-So’s record.

Yeah, so?

On the other hand, a little battling now and then is healthy for hip hop, especially when the emcees can keep it on wax. Who can forget the classic battles like KRS-One vs. MC Shan, Ice Cube vs. NWA, Common vs. Ice Cube, Dr. Dre vs. Easy-E, Canibus vs. LL Cool J, Redman/Kieth Murray vs. Mobb Deep, Def Squad vs. Hit Squad, Aftermath vs. Deathrow, etc. Alot of these spawned classic rap battle songs that were milestones in Hip Hop history. It's just that a few knuckleheadz ruin it for the culture, especially when some chumps on the block take a few battle raps personal and want to get physical because they lack the skills to match you lyrically.

Anyways, the best song about "BEEF" ever made in our opinion is Mighty Mos Def's "What's Beef" where he drops lines like:

Beef ain't the Summer Jam for Hot 97
Beef is the cocaine and AIDS epidemic
Beef don't come with a radio edit
Beef is when the judge is callin' you "defendant"
Beef, it comes with a long jail sentence

Like we do all day everyday, we beef with the Bush crime Family and their Corporatocracy that's sucking us dry, these emcees need to keep the beef on wax, their manicure bills paid, and the coffin sales low. Lets feed some children instead. Peace!