The Second Serve // Bank Holiday Beef

What was supposed to be a nice quiet long weekend has been dominated by the rapidly escalating rap battle between Kendrick Lamar and Drake.

Starting as a bit of standard, slow-rolling antagonism, things blew up this weekend, resulting in daily dropped diss tracks – and Kendrick really caught our attention yesterday by calling Drake out as a massive nonce (something Drake is currently trying to deflect from in his response today: The Heart, Part 6).

The whole spectacle has given us a taste for more sizzling beef – so, in their honour, we’re taking a little trip through history to revisit some of the best feuds in the business.

Before rap beefs got big, the original high-water mark for feuding musicians was Crosby, Stills and Nash.

Things got so bad between them that, on their later tours, each of the band members would have separate tour buses, stay in different hotels from one another and kept completely different sets of management.

But the pettiest part? All three band members requested a different stage flooring. One would stand on a rug, one on a bit of parquet flooring and one on linoleum.

All because they vowed never to share the same stage again.

The Eagles have been famously grouchy with one another for decades and age never did anything to mellow them. The financial incentives to tour meant they chose to keep working together, but it was a complicated set-up.

They refused to travel together, so regularly took separate private jets to the same destinations. There’s nothing especially outrageous about that (in rock star adjusted terms) but soon even that didn’t put enough clear water between them.

At one point, tensions were so bad that the band started grumbling that all their tour equipment was having to travel together – and that was pissing them off. So not only was there talk of having to hire separate planes for each of the band members, but separate planes for each band members’ share of the stage kit too.

Tensions between Sting and Stewart Copeland of The Police are famously fraught. One way Copeland liked to work through his frustrations when they went on tour was to scrawl various messages across his drums – one word per drum head.

Messages like “Sting. Is. A. Cunt.”

Or “Fuck. Off. You. Cunt”.

Mel C v Victoria: During their final tour as a four-piece, Posh walked in on Sporty doing an impersonation of her for the amusement of the crew. When she realised what was happening, she turned on her heel and walked out, refusing to speak to Mel for the rest of the tour.

Victoria v Geri: Geri disliked Victoria so much during their solo careers, she had one of her assistants snip any pictures of Posh out of the papers before she read them. (Geri also wrote a character into early drafts of her kids book called Princess Vattoria, who loved the sound and smell of her own eggy farts.)

Geri v Mel B: Once so close that they ended up shagging, the pair fell out many years later when Mel eventually confirmed the story on Piers Morgan’s Life Stories. Geri was “[disappointed] to read about all these rumours again – especially on Mother’s Day, of all days.”

50 Cent racked up a number of beefs with his rap contemporaries in the 00s: Ja Rule, Jay-Z, Nas, Cam’ron, the Game, Rick Ross and more. It’s not hugely surprising he got into so many tiffs as 50 had an especially stubborn streak to him.

One Popbitcher who was invited on a night out with 50 after a show was surprised to see what happened when they reached the club. 50 didn’t just want the management to give him the classic VIP treatment; he demanded he be paid ten grand, in cash, to come in.

The club refused. 50 wasn’t prepared to haggle. So as the rest of his entourage, managers and G-Unit all went in to party the night away, 50 headed back to the hotel to watch films alone in his room.

Though they were firm friends and collaborators for many years, Kanye West and Jay-Z’s friendship turned very sour in the 2010s. Recaps always discuss the MTV Awards where Kanye caused a Taylor/Beyoncé rift, or the fact that Jay and Bey didn’t turn up to Kim and Kanye’s wedding. But they rarely mention the fall-outs that took place on the Watch The Throne tour.

During production meetings for the New York dates, Kanye became obsessed with the idea that he and Jay-Z would open the show by flying into the venue from outside and landing on the stage, ready to start the first song.

Much to Jay-Z’s growing annoyance, Kanye refused to drop the idea – even though he was told multiple times that it would be impossible to remove the roof from Madison Square Garden for a two night residency.

Last week saw audio rounds based around well known directors and their soundtracks – Spike Lee, Spike Jonze, Sofia Coppola, etc.

This week, we’ve got another set of quizzes lined up for you. You just need to listen to the two-and-a-bit minute mix, figure out what songs are in it and who did them – and give yourself a point for every bit you get right.

Monday’s theme: Rap’s Big Beefers

[Play it here]

A power ranking of everyone involved in the Drake/Kendrick battle
[Pitchfork explains]

A silly little Kanye browser game
[Don’t let him into his zone]

Tired of mainstream rap? Here’s a guide to the current US underground scene
[c/o The Face]