How To Rap: What To Say In a Rap Battle
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How To Rap: What to say in a Rap Battle?
I’ve had several people ask me what you should say in a rap battle. While the idea of a battle is pretty straightforward, it can be hard to know how to win. The best way I can think to frame it is a verbal jousting match. Two opponents talk about each other and those who make the best attack win.
That’s an important distinction. You need to have the best attack, or what’s typically called a punchline to win a battle. The biggest mistake I see new battlers make is that instead of attacking their opponent they focus on hyping themselves up. You can do this if you’re going to make a comparison about how weak your opponent is compared to you, but if you’re self-hyping simply to self-hype, there’s a good chance you’ll lose
You can think about it like a real fight. You can showboat, and that can be a great way to show off your physicality to the crowd and get them amped. If you never throw a punch, however, you’re not going to win. Personally, when judging a battle I’ll disregard lines that don’t attack the opponent, even if it’s really well constructed and clever. You win by making hits, not by showboating.
This means, even if you have to sacrifice technical aspects like rhyming to make a higher impact punchline, do it. That needs to be your number one focus as you battle, and then develop your technical skills around your punchlines. Otherwise you end up with poetically beautiful fluff and lose (Trust me I used to do it all the time).
Another important facet is to recognize your audience. There’s a difference between a freestyle battle at a random party and a written battle at a paid event. Some of the more complex punchlines that will work for hip-hop heads at a paid event, will go completely over the head of the casual listener at a party. Know who you’re speaking to and craft your material accordingly.
For this video, I’m not going to discuss the specifics of crafting a punchline, however I’ll give you a few sources you can draw from to learn punchlines a better. Obviously the best place to learn is watching other rap battles. You can find them all over Youtube and use the crowd’s reaction (plus your own reaction) to understand what works and what doesn’t. Also make sure to listen to the judge’s decisions if they’re available, depending on the venue, you may win the more casual crowd over, but not impress the scrutiny of more experienced judges.
Comedy is another great realm to pull from. Often times, comedians poke fun at something in a clever way in nearly the exact same way as rappers. You will need to adapt the execution slightly to fit the style rap demands, but you can learn a lot. Listen to the way they craft their punchlines. Some use short one liners, others build more elaborate plots and end with a huge haymaker. There’s no wrong or right style, just find what resonates with you and start working on that. Hopefully that helps!
That’s all for this video, feel free to ask questions in the comment box below.
That’s all for this video, feel free to ask questions in the comment box below. You can also check out http://www.RapBetter.com, which is a community dedicated to creating better rappers.
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