We just got done looking at the wildness that was Drake vs Pusha T’s rap beef, so now, we’re gonna be looking at the latest major rap beef. This one comes between two artists you probably wouldn’t have expected to cause such an exciting beef, Eminem and Machine Gun Kelly.
As we did with Drake vs. Pusha, we’ll go over how it started, MGK’s diss track, Eminem’s response to it prior to his own diss, Eminem’s diss, MGK’s response to Em’s track, winners and losers, and if there will be more to come. Here we go.
HOW DID IT START?: This beef actually traces all the way back to 2012. Machine Gun Kelly, a huge Eminem fan all the way back, made a tweet claiming that Eminem’s daughter, Hallie Jade, was “hot as fuck,” but hey, don’t worry about the fact that she was 16 and he was 22, because the gentleman he is, MGK made sure to let it be known that he said that “in the most respectful way possible bcuz Em is king.” I don’t think there’s ever a respectful way to call a girl “hot as fuck,” but go off, I guess. Anyway, MGK apparently brought up the tweet several times in later years in his press runs, and he even accused Eminem of having him blackballed and banned from Shade 45. It got so bad that MGK dropped a subtle diss on Eminem on the song “No Reason” that he did with Tech N9ne, where MGK said “"Popped in on the top charts out the cop car / To remind y'all you just rap, you're not God.” So, naturally, on Eminem’s song “Not Alike” from his surprise album “Kamikaze” that dropped on August 31st, 2018, Em decided to go for the jugular by directly referencing MGK all throughout the second verse, notably saying at one point, “If you wanna come at me with a sub, Machine Gun / And I'm talkin' to you, but you already know who the fuck you are, Kelly / I don't use sublims and sure as fuck don't sneak-diss / But keep commenting on my daughter Hailie.” Now, I’m confused because apparently, MGK popped champagne to the track at first…but it seems he wasn’t as happy as the video showed.
MGK’S DISS TRACK REVIEW/RATING: MGK responded to Eminem’s “Not Alike” pretty quickly. His diss track, “RAP DEVIL,” was released three days after Em’s album dropped. Now look, I think it already takes some brass balls for ANYONE to release an Eminem diss track, so the fact that MGK did it and even got it in the “3-5 business day” period is pretty good. I know I’ve been talking down on the guy a lot because he’s, ya know, dumb, but at least he responded quickly. That said, though, I dunno what’s going on in the cover art. Yeah, he’s doing the “devil horn” thing that Eminem did first but…is he doing it to mock him or as a tribute to him? It’s hard to tell, but either way, I’m not gonna lie, the song does have some pretty neat production. It’s dark, it’s brooding, and it sets the stage nicely. Unfortunately, production isn’t the most important element to a diss track: it’s all about the performances and the bars, so how does MGK do on both? Well…meh. Yeah, some of his somewhat rapid-fire moments are kinda cool, but it just feels like he sticks to the same flow throughout the whole song, which just gets kinda dull. Let’s also not forget the tediously repetitive hook that not even autotune can save (same goes for the bridge), which, by the way, this is a diss track, why do you have a chorus? Freestyle it, man! Freestyle! But anyway, I remember when I first heard the track, I didn’t think it was too bad…then I read the lyrics, and I wondered what I was even thinking. MGK, unfortunately, is not a great lyricist, and you know that the track’s in for a rough start when MGK’s first diss is “his fucking beard is weird.” He continues to throw up cheese bars in the first verse, like “you sound like a bitch, bitch,” and “all you do is read the dictionary and stay inside,” which don’t really sound all that hard to me. Also, MGK, Em is mad about more than what you said in 2012, but I want to point out that you still have yet to acknowledge that calling a 16-year old “hot as fuck” when you’re 22 is disgusting and that there is no respectful way to say someone is “hot as fuck.” But I digress. In any case, Verse 1 also sets up one of the biggest problems with the song: MGK admits that Em is the greatest rapper alive. This is a diss track! You don’t praise the person like that on the other end! And then in terms of the hook, MGK is sick of the “corny hats” and “sweat suits” but I’m tired of his douchey behavior and douchey face, let’s talk about that. Or how he seems to think Em doesn’t deserve to be mad because he’s rich? Because being rich should automatically make you happy? Ugh, whatever. MGK once again brings up the rumors that Em tried to blackball him, but we’ll get to those later because Em’s last four albums are apparently all worse than his selfie. Yes, “Marshall Mathers LP 2” is certainly worse than his intentionally bad selfie. Sure, dude. And while you’re at it, why not again acknowledge that Em is the GOAT, which you shouldn’t do in a diss record? Or how about we tell Eminem to “go back to ‘Recovery’” even though that was three albums ago, and he shouldn’t go back to one of the albums you claim is his worst. Or wait, how MGK talks about how all the Eminem fans discovered him…because, we all know who Machine Gun Kelly is. He goes on to say for some reason that Em is scared to ask Rihanna for her number…uh, okay? He makes a few semi-clever jokes, acknowledges Em as Top 10 (messing up again), calls him “Oscar the Grouch,” and thinks he should apologize, even though MGK won’t apologize for disrespecting someone’s daughter. He also says that Eminem’s name sounds like a candy…uh, zing?…and he drops an admittedly noteworthy (by the standards of the song) finishing bar where he says he “already fucked one rapper’s girl this week” (talking about G-Eazy, of course), and warned Em not to “make [him] call Kim.” That might get a reaction out of some people, and it got me my first time, but it definitely lost its luster after a while. Overall, despite the great production and the somewhat okay flows, “RAP DEVIL” is a shoddy excuse for a diss track, and it honestly feels more to me like a pop-leaning song that masqueraded as a diss song to get more attention. Not the worst thing ever, but still not enjoyable, so this critic is gonna give it a “Bad” rating.
EMINEM’S RESPONSE BEFORE RELEASING HIS TRACK: Now as I said before, as someone that only really got into the rap scene a year ago, at the beginning of the takeover of the SoundCloud kids that only beef through Instagram, I don’t know if artists stay silent before releasing their response tracks all that often. In Eminem’s case, he was silent for a minute, only dropping a hint at the track with him playing Ms. Pac-Man on an arcade machine (of note, MGK has a Pac-Man tattoo on his collarbone, many interpreted this shot as him planning to “go for the throat” with MGK), but things kicked off when he was interviewed by Sway Calloway. In this interview, he discussed the accusations of “blackballing” MGK by stating that his reason for the beef was far pettier than just “he wrote a tweet about my daughter.” Em even viciously said, “First he said, 'I'm the greatest rapper alive since my fave rapper banned me from Shade 45.' I could give a fuck about your career. You think I actually fuckin’ think about you? Do you know how many fuckin’ rappers that are better than you? You’re not even in the conversation.” Already, ouch. But he spoke in the interview about being unsure whether or not to release a track, stating that he tends to worry sometimes about how releasing a diss track, regardless of whether or not it hits hard, only gives the victim of the diss more attention. Still, that doesn’t mean Em was backing down from the challenge, because he most certainly wasn’t.
EMINEM’S DISS TRACK REVIEW/RATING: Alright, look. I’ve been talking all about the “3-5 business day” period with these discussions, but man oh man, Eminem did NOT cater to said period. Man said “boy, I’ll get my package to you when it’s good and ready, sir.” 11 days after “RAP DEVIL,” Eminem released “KILLSHOT” (fortunately, it’s not like the beef lost any attention after that, because the Instagram Live and the Sway interview kept the attention going for it). And even if he took his sweet time getting it out, the wait was worth it. Eminem pulled all the stops with “KILLSHOT,” nailing the song on each and every front, from the production to the flows to the wordplay to the attacks, Em did it all. Hell, his cover art was crazy good, too: a well-drawn artwork of MGK in a scope with X’s through his eyes? Not bad, Em, not bad at all. And I’ll say this: one of the biggest complaints I’ve heard about Em with his recent albums has been that his production is not very good, and personally, most of the production on “Revival” wasn’t very good so I get that, but with “KILLSHOT,” Em didn’t play around. The beat was hard-hitting and catchy (so much so that the song could stand on its own if it wasn’t a diss), and Em rode it so perfectly with very varied, fantastic flows. It wasn’t just constant rapid-fire, Em was always switching things up on this one, keeping the song interesting throughout the whole duration. And of course, Em’s wordplay and lyricism were in top form here, with attack after attack after attack on MGK. With “RAP DEVIL,” it felt more like MGK was giving Em a few playful shoves and giggles, but Em responded with a right hook to Colson’s face. Right when the song kicks off, Em makes fun of some of those corny bars from “RAP DEVIL,” like the “you sound like a bitch bitch” line and the “weird beard” joke, and after MGK said on his track that Em seemed too scared to ask Rihanna for her number, he kicks right off by mentioning that Rihanna just texted him after a night where he was leaving hickeys on her neck. He continues on with that by responding to MGK’s line about his last time seeing “8 Mile” being “at home on a treadmill” by telling MGK that he was actually watching the film on his NordicTrack, and he also criticizes Kelly for the one thing we were all asking: why was MGK insulting him in one line, but then complimenting him on the next line? He even asks, is “that a death threat or, a love letter?” He also responds to MGK’s “weird beard” and “you’re named after a candy” lines by asking how MGK could name himself after a gun while having a man bun. As someone that wears his hair in a bun occasionally…I feel slightly attacked. But no, not really, I’m actually living for that line. I’m also living for how Em mentions that, even if he is old like MGK says, he’s still outselling the 28-year old MGK at 45, and that if MGK really wants to call himself a “prodigy” and wants to approach Eminem, he’s gonna have to catch up because Em had three of rap’s all-time great albums, while Colson doesn’t even have one. He brings more clever wordplay throughout the song by saying that MGK is a “molehill” and that Em will “make a mountain” out of him, and that as long as Eminem is “Shady,” Kels will have to “live in [his] shadow.” He also says that he won’t be like Kels and “go in someone’s daughter’s mouth stealing food,” he says that MGK is a “bow-and-arrow” and not a gunner, and he pokes fun at MGK’s music video for “RAP DEVIL,” where he was eating cereal for no true reason (while also taking Colson’s “dictionary” line and making a parody out of it). He also lightly reminds MGK that his math was off with the “last four albums sucked, go back to ‘Recovery’” line, and he hits hard by mentioning that he had enough money in 2002 to burn it in front of Kels, while also stating that he would rather be himself at 80 years old, on the verge of death, than be MGK at 20 years old. He also reminds Kelly that he’s never been on a “Greatest of All Time” rap list with guys like Jay-Z and Biggie (and also mentioning that he’s closer to Iggy Azalea than them, which is not a compliment) and that the only people he’ll be on a list with are Ja Rule and Benzino, artists that previously had their careers ending by Eminem diss tracks. He goes even further to discuss MGK’s lack of success by mentioning that his “biggest flops” are MGK’s “greatest hits,” and that he should enjoy that this diss track will make him bigger than he’s ever been (special shoutout to the bar where Em says “had to give you a career to destroy it”). He also tells MGK that his track would only get a B for effort (not even an A? Come on, Colson!) and that even if he wanted to play the tough guy image and say that he’ll fight Eminem because he’s so much taller, MGK would still look up to Eminem even if Em was under 4 feet tall. Em gets even more cutthroat when he implies that the only way MGK can have sex with Kim is if Colson disguised himself as Eminem, and how MGK was just “…salty / ‘cause young Gerald’s balls-deep inside of Halsey.” He closes out the song by saying that, even if MGK dresses better, Em still raps better, and that Colson needs to chill with the mumble-rapping and the autotune if he wants to get on Em’s level, dropping a particularly nasty line where he claims that the day MGK puts out a hit song is the day that his boss, Diddy, admits that he put out the hit on 2Pac. First, big ouch, second, double-meanings are crazy! MGK has the Pac-Man tattoo, so he would be “Pac” in this case, and with Diddy allowing “RAP DEVIL” to release, he just got his own artist, “Pac,” killed. As Eminem said after that, “ah!” He then officially concludes the song by telling MGK to keep kissing up to Eminem, while keeping Hallie’s name out of his mouth, and he also hits Diddy with his iconic outro of “I’m just playing, you know I love you.” If you couldn’t tell by all of that, Eminem played zero games on “KILLSHOT,” and he absolutely gets an “Excellent” from me.
MGK’S RESPONSE AFTER EMINEM’S TRACK: MGK, to my everlasting lack of surprise given the person he is, was pretty dismissive of the track. His initial tweet seemed to criticize the long wait for the track, he called the song a “leg shot” (although MGK may not realize that one can still die from a leg shot if you bleed out really fast) and rated it a 6 out of 10. Honestly, if that’s what he thinks about “KILLSHOT,” I want to see what he would rate his own track, because “RAP DEVIL” was certainly no 10. Either way, he also became wrapped up in controversy when he opened for Fall Out Boy and tricked fans into putting up the middle finger for an Instagram pic without knowing that it was intended for Eminem (he was wearing a shirt with the “KILLSHOT” artwork, but it was obscured by his jacket at first), and he was apparently booed while performing “RAP DEVIL” (he claimed that Em and his team doctored boos into the footage, but come on, Colson, you’d pull that on him before he pulls that on you). He also spoke about the track on the Breakfast Club in an interview that was filled with contradictions and silly logic, where he seemed to feel bothered by Eminem’s reference to his “man bun,” even though it was MGK who started his track by pointing out that Eminem’s “beard is weird.” He also seemed surprised that Eminem referred to him as a “mumble rapper,” even though his subsequent EP “BINGE,” that he probably only released to capitalize on the beef, featured several songs that had him “mumble rapping.” He also tried to make us believe that he had another diss track prepared but put it back after hearing “KILLSHOT.” Yeah, Kels, no you didn’t. Stop trying to sound tough. Hell, you released that EP to capitalize on the beef, but it STILL sold terribly, and it ended up getting a 2 out of 5 on Apple Music! Yeah, MGK’s behavior and attitude after “KILLSHOT?” Wack. Really bad.
WHO WON?: It should be pretty obvious, but even when I push the fanboy in me to the side, Em is still the clear winner of the battle. No, this battle wasn’t like Drake and Pusha T where we learned some new, Earth-shattering information about either rapper, but in terms of the brutal nature of the shots fired, it’s no contest that Eminem wins. In flows, wordplay, production, and viciousness, Eminem wiped the floor with MGK. It’s not like it’s much of a surprise, because even if you’re an MGK fan, you’ve gotta admit that the guy stood no chance against Eminem, who has made a living off of doing what he did on “KILLSHOT.” And even if you want to give MGK some brownie points for being ballsy enough to clap back at Em, there’s almost no way you can convince me that he was the winner of the beef.
WHO LOST?: MGK can twist things in any way he wants and try as hard as possible to make himself seem right, but man, face it, you lost. Fair and square, you got destroyed. All that stuff you said in the Charlemagne interview was proven wrong by human beings that actually have brains in their heads. Tricking Fall Out Boy fans into throwing up the middle finger to Eminem and performing the battle-losing song after you lost? Nah, that ain’t it, chief. Hell, Em did the generous thing of donating you a career by making a diss track about you and all your irrelevance, and yet, your “BINGE” EP that you clearly released just in the heat of the battle STILL didn’t even sell. MGK, I’m sorry, but it’s safe to say you’re gonna need to do a lot to get your career…or, whatever’s left of it…back on track. Maybe donate some money to a charity so you’ll look like a little bit less of a tool? Eh, who am I kidding, that’s not gonna help you. Good luck bouncing back, Colson. You probably won’t, but somewhere someone’s praying for you.
IS THERE MORE TO COME?: Eh, probably not. Sure, MGK’s probably not too busy after having his career handed to him on a silver platter, and he could drop another track, but at this point, he’d probably be wise to lay off. He doesn’t want his next project to get 2 stars on Apple Music and fail to move any significant units, does he? Oh, wait…
Alright, kept that one shorter than Drake vs Pusha T, but that’s simply because there was less to dissect this time. Either way, we’ll be getting back to regular album reviews now, so stay tuned for those!
No comments:
Post a Comment