J.I.D has blamed Funk Flex for the reason he “retired” from freestyles.
Shortly after signing to J. Cole‘s Dreamville label in 2017, the Atlanta rapper took part in Flex’s freestyle series on Hot 97, rapping for around six minutes over Screwball’s “F.A.Y.B.A.N.” and Biggie’s “Who Shot Ya?”
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But J.I.D says he didn’t get the reaction he was hoping for from Flex. In a new interview with the Rap Radar Podcast, the Spillage Village MC admitted that spitting for Flex was a “childhood dream,” but the DJ’s muted response left him “a little upset” to the point he decided to pull back from doing freestyles altogether.
“That was a good time. Funk ain’t even understand what was going on,” he said. “He was kerfuffled, I was giving him something and he ain’t even get it. We might go back one day. I silently retired away from the freestyles because I was mad at Flex because he didn’t respond the way I wanted to.”
He continued: “It was like a childhood dream to get the bomb and I ain’t get the bomb or none of the hype, so I was a little upset. But I think I’m gonna get back into the freestyle world just because it’s another part of the art, it’s another notch on your tool belt.”
J.I.D also spoke about his upcoming project DiCaprio 3, which he previously announced will be a Gangsta Grillz collaboration with DJ Drama — just like 2018’s DiCaprio 2.
Except this time around, he’s planning to follow in the footsteps of one particular Gangsta Grillz great and rap over beats from other artists.
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“I think we gon’ really do that,” he told Rap Radar hosts Elliott Wilson and Brian “B.Dot” Miller. “But I kinda wanna do it in nostalgia of how [Lil] Wayne used to do it, just rapping over other people’s beats. I never really tried that.
“I did a couple freestyles and stuff like that, but to the regard of just like, ‘Let me get these 15 beats. I love this artist, I love these beats,’ I never really tried that, so I think I’m gonna do it in that world. Just because.”
J.I.D released his latest album The Forever Story in August 2022 with features from Lil Wayne, 21 Savage, Lil Durk, Yasiin Bey, Ari Lennox and others. The project debuted at No. 12 on the Billboard 200, marking the highest-charting album of his career.
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Revisit his Funk Flex freestyle below.
