Hip-Hop is a cut throat genre and many a times it’s competitive spirit is compared to that of contact sport. This contentious nature in Hip-Hop can be traced to the early 80’s during the days of the block parties having multiple DJ’s present in the same venue, it is here when DJ’s started using emcees to recite rhymes over break sections of the beats to get the attention of the crowd. The crowd would obviously cheer and support the better emcee and many a times in order to win the spectators attention the emcee would mock or make fun of the other DJ’s and emcees present in the venue. I am sure they were not aware that little competitions like this will end up in sowing the seeds for the ‘dissing’ culture.
Things have snow balled since and we have gotten some unforgettable diss tracks and beefs but unfortunately a few lives have been lost as well. We have also witnessed our share of beefs and disses in the relatively nascent Desi Hip-Hop scene. Last year, we saw Raftaar and Emiway going to and fro, dropping diss tracks back and forth. It all started when Emiway fired shots at Raftaar and Divine in the track, ‘Samajh mein aaya kya‘. Raftaar immediately clapped back with, ‘Sheikh Chilli‘ and this was NOT the last release by them on this matter. Here’s a little crash course on what happened Incase you missed it:
Fast forward to 2019, just when you thought things have calmed down and everyone is doing their thing, we get KR$NA going berserk over Emiway. KR$NA aka Krishna Kaul is Raftaar’s label mate and long time collaborator. He dropped, ‘Freeverse Feast’ and there is no denying that he went ham on it. The title of the diss itself was a jab at Emiway, as he had also released a track with the same title.
In case you think one diss was not enough, KR$NA heard you loud and clear and dropped another track called, ‘Seedha Makeover’. The title is very clearly a play on the last release by Emiway which was, ‘Seedha Takeover’. One thing which is uniform in both the releases is that he has a problem with Emiway claiming that he represents India and has mentioned this on both the disses in typical Delhi fashion. The Gurugram native also dissed DAX who recently featured on Emiway’s track, ‘I BEEN THAT’. We are yet to see if Emiway will respond to this or will he stay silent.
A lot of folks are also anticipating a track called, ‘Remaand’ on Divine’s album KOHINOOR. Apparently he has addressed a few folks who have been mentioning his name in conversations in which he never wanted to be mentioned.
Dissing is an essential part of Hip-Hop and is required to maintain it’s competitive spirit and while doing so it pushes the envelope for lyricists to constantly sharpen their skill. We hope the dissing only sticks to the tracks and we never get to witness any physical manifestations of the same.