S. Samuel
With our first quarter Top 5 Dead or Alive match-ups in the books, we are pitting the first 10 weekly winners against one another to see whose list truly reigns supreme. In Round 1, there will be five total match-ups based one winning percentages. The match-up with the highest Round 1 winning percentage will be automatically placed in the Finals. Let’s get ready to rumble!
In today’s fourth 1st Week match-up, West Coast rapper Blu hopes to shade in a win as his picks match-up against Ninjasonik’s Telli. Will Blu see gold or can Telli move like a ninja and sneak in a win? Who makes it to next week’s Round 2 match-up? You decide!
| BLU’S PICKS | | | TELLI’S PICKS |
|
I want to go with OutKast as one entry for my first pick. Look at what they’ve done across the board. Big Boi is the street and Andre is straight from outer space. And then they meet at a medium on all those records. It’s a sound that’s out of this world. It’s so relevant. |
 |
 |
You have to put Lupe Fiasco in the list because he’s a straight up animal. Come on, we all need to give him his props. Lupe is one of the best rappers that’s out and deserves to get more respect than he gets. We need to give him his props as one of the best. He’s one of the greatest rappers of this generation. I really don’t feel like he’s gotten the respect he deserves. |
|
Redman. Just look at [his album] Muddy Waters. Hands down. There’s no album where verse for verse for 23 songs, [the artist] is just beasting. There’s no other reason you need to know other than that album. |
 |
 |
And what about Slick Rick? Come on, you’re talking about one of the greatest storytellers in rap music. Just take the time to listen to “Children’s Story” and hear what he’s talking about. Slick Rick is a legend. The first rhyme I ever learned was “Children’s Story.” |
|
Common gets my pick for dropping all of the knowledge and letting the up-and-coming generations know that it’s all good to be a positive role model on the mic. But at the same time, he’s showing you can still bring it. Common was Common and even brought it to Ice Cube back in the day. And at the time, Common was like the younger head and definitely put in a lot work. |
 |
 |
Just listen to Ice Cube. He’s another hip-hop legend. Come on. He had the N.W.A. sh*t and his own solo movement back in the day. There’s too many n*ggas that you can name in this list but Ice Cube’s gotta be in there. |
|
Black Thought. Black Thought drops way too many gems in his music. You can uncover a Black Thought line years later that’s so impactful and play it over and over. You’ll probably uncover five Black Thought lines in a year that you never thought about. Like, “D*mn, I’ve been listening to this album for years and I just now am getting that line.” |
 |
 |
I remember LL Cool J was always bad. He’s one of my favorites from growing up. I always loved LL Cool J. LL is one of the best battle rappers ever. |
|
Mos Def, for being like hip-hop’s first “little brother”. He was like Afrika Bambaataa and everybody all the way down. He was like a baby KRS-One. I feel like when Mos Def dropped, he was all of the New York emcees in one. That’s Mos Def to me. I don’t know any other way to explain it. If you listen to him, you can hear it. |
 |
 |
And the last rapper in the list would have to be a group. I gotta name The Beastie Boys. They’re in my list as well. |
