Busta Rhymes was summoned to Los Angeles for an explosive halftime performance this past week, and the hosting team was just as thrilled as their fans to have him grace the field.
On Thursday (December 21), the Los Angeles Rams played the New Orleans Saints in a winning effort that ended in a 30-22 tally. Between the halves, Bus took over the massive field and performed a brief set of career-spanning hits to a packed crowd at the SoFi Stadium.
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Prior to his show, team members of the Rams hyped up the performance by taking a go at the New York MC’s iconic verse from 2011’s “Look At Me Now” in a promotional social media clip.
Check out footage from the performance as well as the NFL stars rapping below:
Busta Rhymes entertains Rams & Saints fans with halftime performance 🔥 https://t.co/3Yh0bOWXIApic.twitter.com/mRvMz7lliF
— HipHopDX (@HipHopDX) December 23, 2023
@rams told em to busta rhyme 🎤 #nflplayers#bustarhymes#larams♬ original sound – Los Angeles Rams
Though Busta Rhymes is now considered among Hip Hop’s greatest wordsmiths, he recently admitted that he never intended to become a rapper. Earlier this month, the rapper stopped by The Diary of the CEO for a chat, during which he revealed that he wanted to be a DJ when he first took an interest in the culture.
“I never really got good at it to be the DJ,” he said. “I was able to do it, but I was never nice enough to become the superstar DJ. And at that time, the DJ was super important. Because all of the groups had the DJ name. The DJ was always the big shot. I’m not really the technology dude, so all of this equipment shit, it was just a little complicated for me.”
After catching his second charge for selling crack by the time he was 12, Busta said his mother relocated him to Long Island, where he met his Leaders Of The New School groupmate Charlie Brown. While the two became friends fast, a desire to get back at Brown is what drove Bus to write his first rhyme at the age of 13.
“Charlie Brown was like the number one rap dude in school at the time,” he recalled. “So one day I’m coming out of the school and we get in the school yard; there was a cypher that was formed on this particular day and it was a big one. There was C. Brown rapping and two other kids; and C. Brown was getting most of the shine. I walk over to the cypher and I started beatboxing. Brown he’s doing his rap shit to my beatbox, I’m keeping the beat going for him.”
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He continued: “Everything was smooth in the beginning,” he continued. “And then like probably like a good 30-40 seconds into it, he just started disrespecting me. And I’m kinda torn between should I punch this dude in his face, or should I keep beatboxing and not be the party pooper of the party energy that we’re having here. And I’m saying to myself, ‘I’m from Brooklyn.’”
Just as he thought he would have to get physical, Busta said Brown stopped rapping and began getting props from the other kids in the yard.
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“I ain’t wanna look like a sore loser, even though there was no battle, he just chose to diss me for no reason,” Busta told the host. “Long story short, that was the day I said, ‘Aight, I’ma go home and I’ma write a rhyme tonight. And I’ma come back tomorrow and I’ma fuckin’ disrespect this you in front of everybody.’”
