Yo, Remember When Jay-Z & DMX Had Beef? Posted by Nathan S. on 02/08/12 | Filed under Features, Jay-Z, Rap Nerdery, DMX

I'm sure I knew about this when it happened, I must have. There's no way that something like beef between Jay-Z and DMX could have happened without me knowing about it. But whether it was the repeated concussions or the Jack Daniels wheat grass shots, when I came across a video of Irv Gotti breaking down the conflict between the two legendary (but vastly different) emcees my brain was empty.

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Since I know there are some like me who missed this little chunk of hip-hop history, and RefinedHype rap nerds who welcome the chance to kill time at work, let's revisit the rough time line.

This type of shit - two major rappers battling for the fuck of it - would never happen now, but it all started when Jay and DMX threw down and Hova bounced from the battle before DMX had the chance to respond. Before long long everyone was whispering "yo, you hear that DMX lost to Jay in a battle?!?" and DMX was furious. (Ski Beatz gives more details here.)



With that beef simmering in the background, Jay agreed to put down a verse on Mic Geronimo's "Time to Build", not knowing that DMX had already laid down a guest verse of his own. A salty Hov, mad that he wasn't closing the track, embedded his verse with X disses that references the previous battle. (Side note: "Time to Build" also featured Ja Rule way back when Ja was actually considered a hard rapper.)



DMX was now doubly-pissed. He felt like Jay had done him dirty during the battle, and now he snuck in some disses after X had already put down his verse. And from there? Well, Jay and X continued to dislike each other, an incident at a DMX show sparked things further, and Hova got richer and more successful and DMX slowly but surely fell apart. But never let it be said that X doesn't hold a grudge:

"I'm man enough to let him know why it's 'F*ck You', but it's still 'F*ck You'! That's what it is. I'll let you know why, I can do that. It ain't like you gotta worry about me running up on you shooting you. It ain't that serious. You don't owe me nothing. But if you want an explanation as to why it's 'F*ck You', I'll be more than happy to tell you why." - Yep, that quote's from 06/11

DMX vs. Jay was passion and anger vs. cool and collected, reckless destruction vs. calculated maneuvers. It was a hip-hop battle for the ages, and it's a fucking shame that the world will (apparently) never get to see it. At least know I can remember it actually happened at all.