In the latest Angry Fans podcast, rapper Mickey Factz speaks about watching Battle Rap for nearly two decades and feeling like the scene has “been dead since” the beginning of 2013.
Breaking down his reasoning, Factz, who still battles himself, also confirmed plans to battle Daylyt this Spring. “What I’ve been saying is what people are starting to say now,” he said. “I’ve been saying this for a year now…I’ve been saying Battle Rap is dead since January 20, 2013… I first saw it back in 2013 and I was saying it, when I saying it, there were people like, ‘Ah, what are you talking?’ I’m like, ‘Listen man, shit is looking different, shit is not feeling the same. Everything is crazy, nobody believe me, everybody thought I was wilding. Next thing you know, shit just started getting wacker and wacker and wacker.
“Now, my personal opinion is not all of Battle Rap is wack, what has gotten wack has been the street element of Battle Rap,” he continued. “Which is basically like the URL kind of battlers and all of the smaller leagues that host most of the street battles. Ironically who has had better battles has been the KOTD style battling and the Don’t Flop stuff, their stuff has been actually better than what I’ve come up on back in the days. Maybe it’s just a cycle, but right now I don’t really see a light at the end of the tunnel for urban, street Battle Rap.”
Asked about he’s grown to dislike, Factz went on to describe how he feels Summer Madness 2 was a peak the industry hasn’t revisited. “It started to get extremely redundant,” he said. “I’ve been following Battle Rap since 1996. So, I’ve seen a lot of people come, I’ve seen a lot of people go. I’ve seen a lot of different styles and to be honest I feel like the peak of street Battle Rap has ended, it stopped after Summer Madness 2 [in 2012]. Maybe it was because it hit such a high pinnacle that maybe it was like, how do you top this? However there has been some good stuff afterwards, not everything that came out after Summer Madness 2 has been weak but the quality of the product and the content has definitely diminished on everybody’s behalf. I feel like right now…before, I was not excited for Reed Dollaz, now I am so pumped for Reed Dollaz to come back. Because at this point if somebody was to blindfold me and tell me to listen to all the new battles that’s out, I could not not tell you who is who. I couldn’t. Everything is literally the same shit.”
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Still, when talking about a new crop of Battle Rap emcees, Mickey rattled off several as proof that’s he’s not simply oblivious to the latest developments. “I’m not a fan of the PG guys,” he said. “I’m really not. I’m not a fan of none of them, not one. I was rocking with Prez Mafia for a little bit. I think he’s a dope talent but I think he took too many battles. I like XL but I only saw one battle from XL. But outside of those two, I’m not a fan of none of’em. Danny Myers? I’m not a fan of Danny Myers. Ty Law? I’m not a fan of Ty Law. Sno? I’m not a fan of Sno. I’m not a fan of none of these guys.
“It’s just not the same feel,” he continued. “I don’t have the same feel for it…I’ve spoken to cats a lot about the history of New York City Battle Rap…Back in those days, it was originality that was there, it was definitely a persona, it was definitely a charisma, there was a personality, it felt more real. Now it feels extremely scripted, everything just feels scripted. Back in those days, if you saw two motherfuckers battling, most times they would actually be nice at rapping as well. If you put a beat on they would have a crazy cypher. This is just my opinion, I don’t feel like if you threw a beat on, these motherfuckers would go off.”
The rapper added that he thinks many battlers are too one-dimensional in their approach. “These guys that are coming in are saying, ‘Man, fuck top tier, we wanna kill top tier,’” he said. “I’m with that, but that’s all you showing us, that you just wanna kill, kill, kill. You’re not showing me that you’re a real person, I don’t even know who the hell you are. You’re just coming out of the woodwork saying this and then when I listen to this shit, yeah it’s dope, but I feel like niggas is trying so hard to be nice. I just feel like niggas are going too hard with the wordplay, too hard with the punches. Punchlines used to be a special thing. If a nigga had punchlines it be like, ‘Wooo.’ Now everybody’s doing them so it’s just like a flip of a switch, it’s like ‘Aw, whatever, another guy with another punchline,’ or ‘Here we go with another scheme. Here we go.’”
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Describing his own ongoing battle career, Factz detailed finalizing a scheduled match-up against Daylyt. “It’s almost secure,” he said. “I just got the contract today. We gotta go over some of the stuff in the contract. Once it’s good to go, me and Daylyt, three rounds, three minutes in the Quiet Room. For May.
“Daylyt is my homie outside of Battle Rap,” he added. “If he does an antic it’s probably gonna be a funny antic, as long as he doesn’t get naked.”
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