Yes yes yall, and you don't stop...

“I wasn't salty she was wit the Boyz N the Hood” K. Billy

Last week, I touched on battle rap in some of its more recent incarnations, drawing on some of those examples and trying to reconcile what makes a great battle song. Jus gave us some quality examples on Wednesday, but he didn’t name every great battle song there was. Back in the early 90’s Ice Cube and a young Chi-town rapper named Common Sense got into one of the strangest and most unpredictable tiffs ever put on wax. However, the conflict resulted in one of Comm’s hardest songs ever.

I don’t really remember the impact that some of the early battles had on hip-hop. Most of the effect for me was residual. However, once I did get the opportunity to appreciate some of what was going on, I dug in the crates quite often so I remember picking up Common’s “The Bitch in You” a little while after it had already come out and their battle was long since quieted.

Besides being a battle song, it was just a good track. Well produced, lyrically strong; with the right amount of fervor, it becomes something more than just a nice song: “A bitch ni**a with an attitude named Cube,” is the first line. From there, he goes on to somehow simultaneously show Cube and the Westside Connection his ass while also trying to show respect at the same time: ”Now what the fuck I look like/dissin’ a whole coast/you ain’t made shit dope since AmeriKKKas Most…” Harsh words from the usually passive Comm, no?

The interesting thing about this song that works to differentiate it from a lot of the battle songs that have come out in the past or since, is that you can almost tell that Common is genuinely hurt by some of Cube’s remarks in “Westside Slaughterhouse,” an aptly titled track featuring lines like: “All you suckas want to dis the pacific/But you buster ni**as never get specific/Used to love her mad cause we fucked her/pussy whipped bitch with no common sense.” Comm’s words were probably taken out of context, especially considering it was really only one line in “Used to Love H.E.R.” that makes any reference whatsoever to the boys from the left coast, but it ended up creating one of the best written battle raps ever done. It may not be the best one, but it’s damn near close.