BATTLE DESCRIPTION.
Well, well, well, look who turned up: Me, Shuffle T Vs Unanymous. The clash. This is an interesting one to look back on, for me. I enjoy it, but have some issues with it, as a whole. My performance overall is alright, but I’m pretty sure this is the last time I underestimated my opponent in a rap battle.
That might sound because Unanymous is considered a hugely talented and capable battler, so why would you underestimate him? Well, contextually, Unan had just come off the back of a few chokes and bad performances and so he had been framed as the underdog for this battle with interviews across the scene showing that people thought I would walk it.
SO DID YOU WALK IT?
I did naaaat walk it. It’s not 100% clear cut, but the general consensus, I think, is that Unan won this battle… maybe that’s just me, but I don’t think so. His material was really strong, his performance was clean and he switched his style up a bit to accommodate and nullify my jokey approach. It was a masterclass, really, and watching it back, even now, it’s very impressive to see how well he dismantled me and won the crowd over, simply by being confident, direct, clever and funny.
On my side, as I say, I think my performance is okay, apart from that fucking cringy bit when I go to put the fake weed in my mouth and my hand shakes intensely! I always have a bit of the adrenaline shakes when I go into a battle, but I keep making small movements so that it’s harder to clock on watch-back or from the crowd’s perspective, but when I have to do something that involved a bit of co-ordination like putting something in my mouth (insert blowjob joke), all dexterity goes out the fucking window.
THE ROUNDS.
Also, I think that my 2nd round was a bit misjudged in this one. I do this whole thing about how I’m more pathetic than him and would do worse in a fight. This kind of thing is definitely more of a straight rap track idea, rather than a battle rap concept. I later realised this and included it as a track in my EP from February 2022, ‘Yeah, I know…’. It 100% worked better in that format.
I thought my 3rd round would go down a bit better than it did. I like doing little wordplay bits here and there and trying to be clever without, necessarily, being funny, but I think sometimes it’s just not what an audience wants to hear from a Shuffle T battle, so it’s always a bit of a gamble. Having said that, maybe the wordplay was just a bit shit. Hard to call it.
MARLO BEEF.
Marlo snaked me. Livid. He betrayed me. My own husband, I couldn’t believe it. At the time of the battle, he had warned me he had some involvement from Unan’s side, but I didn’t know what, but when it happened, I must admit I was a bit shocked… Not because of any genuine feelings of betrayal, that’s just me messing around, it was just one of those things where literally everybody in that room was laughing at me and I felt stupid. You’d think that would happen a lot in battle rap, but it doesn’t, really, I’m usually laughing along with my opponent (even just on the inside). But here, I really felt like a knob. And that right there, for me is one of the main reasons I would give as to why Unan won. He smashed it.
The battle was really well-received, though. I’m still proud of it and I don’t really battle to win, but it’s always better when they’re close and both sides really go for it. I think we had that in this one. Unan is an interesting performer. He’s somebody who seems to go through phases in his battles and can level up dramatically with almost no warning. If you get him on a good day, he’s pretty unbeatable. He’s recently been in rare form and it’s 100% worth watching some of his latest ones. Check out his back catalogue at versetracker.
EXTRAS.
We also had Unanymous on an episode of Sounds Like and he did great on it. Showing off his knowledge of battle rap, rhymes and, of course, cake. You can find that here:
Also, a lesser-known Shuffle T vs Unanymous is also out there. A freestyle compliment battle outside of the Fiddler’s Elbow in Camden. Here it is on Versetracker.