Comparisons and battles are about as old as the hip hop genre. As long as there has been rap, there have been pundits and listeners comparing their favorite artists, wondering who is better bar for bar. Sometimes, rappers battle each other and let the crowd decide. Other times, they throw barbs through song, leaving it up to debate who actually won. This time, we have 50 Cent calling out Jay Z, saying that Eminem is a better battle rapper, and that other artists are upset that a white rapper can do it “better than black artists.”
“Hip Hop is Black music, without question, and, unfortunately for some people, it’s tough to accept that you have a White artist that does it better than Black artists,” 50 Cent says during an interview with Music Choice. “It is what it is. You can get like whoever you think is the best Black artist and stand them face-to-face in a room with Em and he will eat that [guy] alive. Right now if you had ’em prepare themselves, whatever way they would have to prepare themselves to come battle…I bet what I have, everything” that Eminem would win.
50 and Jay had their own feud for a bit, but it has long since simmered off. This past June, 50 even called Jay overrated in jest, referring to Jay Z’s line on Kanye’s “So Appalled” record.
“Overrated?” 50 said. “Jay Z. He would say he’s overrated. ‘Rather be overrated than underpaid.'”
