Hip-Hop Knock out Cup
 

I feel a lot of people on this forum turn their noses up to hip-hop and therefore are missing out on a lot of great music.

Therefore I have come up with a idea which will allow us to contrast and compare hip-hop artists whilst opening peoples eyes to MC's whom we may not all be familiar with. There'll be a mix of old and new MC's so many different styles are represented.

Basically 80 MC's randomly drawn to compete against one another, the winner of each tie (the one with most votes, you can only vote once per tie) advances to the next round in a straight knock-out formula.

It's not just a case of voting, it's a case of trying to persuade others that your favoured MC is indeed better than the other.

The first random tie will take place tomorrow.

Here's the list of MC's


J.Cole
Jay Electronica
Jay-Z
Kanye West
Nas
Notorious BIG
2Pac
Kendrick Lemar
Ab-Soul
El-P
Killer Mike
Aesop Rock
Big Pun
Fat Joe
Big L
Tyler the Creator
Big KRIT
Big Boi
Andre 3000
Talib Kweli
Mos Def
Black Thought
Ice Cube
Common
Del The Funkee Homesapian
Dr Dre
MF Doom
Masta Ace
Slick Rick
AZ
Busta Rhymes
TI
Big Shug
Rakim
Blu
Danny Brown
Jean Grae
Lil Kim
Mac Dre
Grandmaster Flash
Diabolic
Eminem
Atmosphere
Eydea
Sage Francis
Brother Ali
LL Cool J
Chuck D
Heavy D
Missy Elliott
Ghostface Killah
Raekwon
GZA
RZA
Method Man
Redman
Inspectah Deck
Masta Killa
Papoose
Kool Moe Dee
Earl Sweatshirt
Will Smith
Snoop Dogg
ASAP Rocky
Q-Tip
Kool G Rap
Big Daddy Kane
Kool Keith
B-Real
Prodigy
Aceyalone
Kurupt
Foxy Brown
Guru
Ice-T
Pharaohe Monch
Xzibit
Scarface
KRS-One
Lauryn Hill

Obviously I couldn't include every MC ever to spit a beat, and unless I have made some glaring omissions this is the list going forward. Let me know if you think I have.

Everyone's free to participate so hopefully this works out well.

RSVP'd.

Great idea. Obviously a few missing, but it's good enough for me.

Probably not gonna work. Everyone votes on their favorite for a reason. You're not going to convince others to change their mind. I really don't envision anyone having an "ah-ha" moment and being like "you know what, my opinion was weak and ill-informed, so I concede my personal point of view." In the end majority will rule either way, but since the goal seems to be to encourage discussion and open peoples' eyes to artists that they may me unfamiliar with, then you can count me in as well.

I always love these kinds of things, but I think it needs more. If we're going to do a throwdown like it's the be-all of throwdowns on the topic here at MB, we should do it right from the start or we can't expect true involvement or enjoyment or proper results. It doesn't need to be every rapper to spit a beat, but it won't get off right if we get feelings and statements like "Pshh you got Will Smith up there but you don't have Poor Righteous Teachers or The Goats or Souls of Mischief, or Freestyle Fellowship, or any of their members" Or "You got Blu, but none of the Living Legends or Hieroglyphics or Oldominion" Or "You got Snoop Dogg you might as well throw up the Kottonmouth Kings" and truth be, why not?

We should take a few days or a week or so and PM or list any ADDITIONS to the list that you feel need to be on the list. Perhaps to help we could include years of activity (f. ex. Eligh of Living Legends 1991-present)[just looked at wikipedia but that's good enough].

I really can see myself getting excited about a bracket, but we should iron out details besides who alls in it. Are we doing it be decade or style/subgenre or both? What other things should we consider?

Oh and I don't mean to hijack anything, just adding lots of ideas. But I do need to add quite a few artists to your list to be able to enjoy myself on it.

Appreciate your input D00d.
A couple of things though, you mentioned the inclusion of groups such as The Goats and Poor Righteous Teachers. I didn't want to include groups because then what do you do about units such as Wu-Tang and NWA where members have went on to have successful solo careers, surely it's unfair to have a whole group battle GZA or alternatively the whole of the Wu-Tang battling someone like Biggie.

As I said before if there are any glaring omissions, individual MC's whose impact has been so great that they might go onto win the tournament that I have missed out I am more than happy to include them, but I feel if we spent time tinkering the list to pander to each members personal favourites we'd never get this under way.

I think the best way to do it is just MC vs MC, I think dividing into subcategories such as style, popularity and period of prominence would serve only to complicate matters and turn people away from participating.

I've made a few ammendments to the list that I've spotted myself but on the whole I'm pretty satisfied with it and I don't plan on increasing the number over 80, just as 80 is a divisible into 40, 20, 10 and then the final 5 without dragging the tourney out too long.

Hell, if this is a success, I'm sure we can expand on this a year from now and include more groups, MC's and delve into obscurity if it calls for, but for now I want to see how things go with this list.

First tie begins in 6 hours.

Diabolic: A talented underground rapper many consider to be the right hand man of Immortal Technique, Diabolic has only released one studio album 2010's Liar & Theif which was awarded the 2010 HHUG Best Album of the Year award and featured guess spots by the likes of Kool G. Rap and Canibus.

Personally I enjoyed this album which was a politically and emotionally charged effort showcasing the range of Diabolics clever lyrics and angry delivery.

He has also released a handful of mixtapes with a seconded album expected to be released later this year.
Diabolic first shot to prominence after delivering the last 2 and a bit minutes of Immortal Techniques cult classic 'Dance With The Devil'



Here's some of the material off his first full length.





Aceyalone: I was first introduced to 90's west coast rapper Aceyalone by fellow forum member Goofle11 in an album swap thread.
I knew right away after hearing the album 'All Balls Don't Bounce' this guy was extremely good.
One of the most versatile rappers I've heard with a great; delivery, flow and clever lyricism.
He is a member of the group Freestyle Fellowship, here's the man freestyling here:



As a solo artist Aceyalone has released 10 albums as well 5 as part of Freestyle Fellowship, 2 as part of group Haiku D'Etat and 2 as part of The A-Team so it's apparent the guy gets around showcasing his versatility.

Here's a selection of his music.

So what are we supposed to do here? Pick one of the artists you mentioned?

I assume, and he goes through to the next round I would think.