There has been vast increase in popularity of battle rap over recent years.  This has lead to a debate over whether rappers should venture into rap battling vs songwriting.  I touched on this in an old post where I talked about the battle between Canibus VS Dizaster.

The rap battle scene has been growing steadily over the years.  There was a time when a battle was something that would break out spontaneously between rappers and it was often very improvised and less pre-planned.  Nowadays battles are far more scripted.  Many are setup as big events almost like boxing, with rappers going away weeks to months in advance reading up on each other preparing their disses for the big event.  Battling now seems to be far more of a separate entity from that of making rap songs.  If we were having this debate during the pre-youtube era it would be far more clear cut in favour of songwriting but with the growth and popularity of battling the answer is no longer so obvious.Continue reading→