Inside The Tongue vs Chance Waters Beef

One of the more compelling elements of hip hop narrative has always been the rivalries. The infamous beef of the ‘90s between America’s East and West Coast crews was defined by the supposed hatred between Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G. The two labels involved, Death Row Records and Bad Boy Records, made shit-tons of cash, and the two rappers ended up dead.

The whole ’90s was rife with beef – N.W.A vs Ice Cube; Easy-E vs Dre; G-Unit vs The Game – and Nas and Jay-Z took up the mantle in 2001, via the power of radio. Jay appeared at Hot 97’s Summer Jam concert and slagged off his rival during the song ‘Takeover’; Nas responded on air some weeks later with a freestyle that he called ‘H To The Omo’. (Real mature, Bradley.) Since then, there’s been Azealia Banks vs Kreayshawn, T.I., Lil Kim and Nicki Minaj; there’s been Drake vs Chris Brown; there’s been fake Ghostface Killah vs everyone; and, most recently, there’s been Gucci Mane vs Waka Flocka Flame.

These feuds have a theatrical element sustained by the fans and the general public, and in the internet age have a far longer shelf-life. Just think of how many more years Tupac and Biggie could have gone at it with the aid of Twitter screen shots and online forums.

And so, inevitably, it begins at home. Australian hip hop is possessed of all the bravado, ego and competition that feuds are made of – and when Twitter gets involved, it can all blow up. Which, thanks largely to the good folk at triple j, is exactly what happened yesterday.

The Tongue vs Chance Waters 

A bit of background: The Tongue is an MC with a solid background in live battles, signed to Urthboy’s independent hip hop label Elefant Traks; Chance Waters, previously known as Phat Chance, is a solo artist on his own label I Forget, Sorry!. Both are Sydneysiders, but they possess vastly different styles and aesthetics.

Chance is a fan of repping his lifestyle choice as a vegan, and over Facebook and Twitter prolifically posts about topics ranging from real estate applications to his imminent driving test. His online engagement with his fanbase has proven hugely successful, and kids will turn out in droves for his upcoming national tour. The Tongue, known to his mother as Xannon Shirley, maintains a similarly large online presence, albeit one that focuses the public’s attention on the notion of a rapper’s talent, and the degree of recognition accorded.

The beginning of yesterday’s action was the posting of an interview on ozhiphop.com with The Tongue, ahead of the release of his third album Surrender To Victory. In the interview, Shirley discussed his stance on the success of rapper 360, in particular the pop star’s young fanbase and his controversial performance at SxSW. “It’s frustrating that this big, successful guy doesn’t expect more from himself,” he said, before moving on to Chance Waters: “I just don’t think the dude can rap. Sorry, but that’s how I see it. It’s nice when everyone in the scene can get along but I can’t co-sign everything and I think we need to start having clear standards for our hip hop in this country.”

The article was tweeted out by OzHipHop like so:

And responded to by The Tongue like so:

Chance Waters caught wind of it and started tweeting at the Tongue; the Tongue started tweeting back. Cue the frothing of Music Feeds, Man Made Mag and a slew of other blogs – and coverage from triple j, too. The radio station’s hosts leaned in to the fray on twitter, and the triple j website posted a timeline of the exchanges between Waters and The Tongue, complete with amusing warnings of STRONG LANGUAGE AND BEEFING. As the reader scrolls they’re provided with annotations advising them that “we’re away” and “Most of the Australian hip hop community *grabs popcorn*. Illy, Seth Sentry, Hilltop Hoods and, quite possibly, 360 weigh in.”

But here’s the rub – it wasn’t really a fight. Admittedly The Tongue did tweet out that “fuck you”, but it just led both parties to agree to disagree about their respective stance on feminism and the differences in how they define feelings and opinions. At the end of proceedings, Waters agreed that The Tongue’s original quote “was much more forgiving in context.”

Was it a case of the national broadcaster’s youth wing trying to engineer a shit-storm? Waters doesn’t think so. “I don’t think it was overly manufactured,” he says. “In many ways it’s just the nature of the way the technology works. Once people start following you they can see everything on Twitter, as it happens. Once other artists get involved everyone starts clicking. In the end the argument was so minor, and like I said, the comments in context weren’t that big a deal. I have bigger arguments every day about heaps of things. The difference this time is that it got picked up by a whole bunch of blogs.”

The Tongue is adamant that public and private debate must be maintained. “I don’t want to be part of a scene where artists are not able to argue about things and present differing opinions. A difference of opinion, even a passionate one, is not ‘beef’. I understand why people are attracted to conflict, but the music media has a responsibility to focus on the positives, like the music we’re actually putting out and the places we take the show.”

Waters is circumspect about the whole episode. “To be perfectly honest, we’re completely starved of beefs in Australian hip hop,” the vegan laughs. “There won’t be any drive-bys as a result of yesterday, and certainly no punch-ups. I s’pose the best part of it is that any coverage is good coverage.”

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Benjamin Cooper is a Sydney-based writer who listens to far too much hip hop and drone, and has started a pick-up gridiron league for fun. He has written for The Brag, TheVine, Cyclic Defrost, Beat, Xpress, and Time Out Australia.