First off, dope topic. I fuck with it being political to an extent - without overdoing that, and it’s interesting to see what you guys will do with it.
Sin: I actually think your style lends itself quite well to this sort of thing. It reminded me of DMX - Who We Be to a degree with these kind of short snippets and the constant pauses and whatnot. I can see why you wouldn’t go for a “storytelling” piece as such to this topic and relied more heavily on these cinematic flashes and whatnot instead, brief visual images are handed to the reader instead and that works well with the topic provided. It may not be to everyone’s tastes, and could well cost you somewhat given people are almost expecting a tale with a twist in these sorts of things, but for me it works better than it should here in that respect. The Hitler in hells flames I liked. It maybe doesn’t deal with Hitler directly in the image but obviously the racism angle behind it tied in, maybe I could see the religion angle a little also here and there scattered throughout. I know it’s been mentioned in a few of your pieces but the repeated phrases like “hell” and “king” aren’t too everyone’s taste. I think if you used them more sparingly they would have more impact, used occasionally it can actually add something with a more poetic flavour, but it’s all about finding that balance - if it feels overused it starts to become somewhat samey and expected and can actually distract away from the verse negatively which might be something to look at and learn from. I’ve definitely seen more people have a dislike toward that than a liking, but it can be done effectively, I’m sure, it just needs some honing and maybe stripping back somewhat.
Pharoah: I liked the directness of that opening sentence, if not the whole line, but it gave the reader a very clear offset. The brevity of that initial statement set the tone well for you, dealing directly with the image here, before tying in the likes of JLK and MLK. If anything I almost wish you had taken a more narrative approach with this, maybe through the eyes of one of the children you bring up right at the end. It could have been through a child’s eyes, trying to make sense of what they see (or were being taught in a History class or something on Slavery etc?) and tried to explain things through their naive eyes. I think that could have added another element to this that took it up and beyond your opponents verse. You had had the more directly applicable take (in my opinion) that I can see more people liking, largely because we (as readers) have seen Sinacog do this kind of verse many times over previously. This one from him maybe has more in the way of it applying to the image, maybe it’s just open enough to interpretation that quite a few different aspects could play into it, but the strong religious overtones we know him for are prevalent once again in this verse (which I think works to an extent this time out). It’s not new ground we haven’t seen covered before, but this one is one of his better worked due to the image displayed and how can it can interpreted I guess. I think in terms of technical difficulty, Sin did a lot more by way of scheming and multies than Pharoah here, so I’ve taken that into account also, but I did really like parts of PA’s verse - like I commented on about that initial opening short sentence - which I felt he excelled in here. I’m not overlooking that either. The “message” if you like was a lot clearer, less convoluted, more stripped down and doing more with less so it’s not a case of technical merit winning out over everything.
I have it like this: Sinacog did better than what were usually accustomed to reading from him, the verse is inherently chocked full of his tried and tested religious overtones and biblical references, almost in a sort of train of thought style with a larger focus on the mechanics of the verse and adding a degree of difficulty to it that he somewhat outshone his opponent on. Pharoah tended to focus more directly on the topic supplied, and while he maybe didn’t show the same technical sufficiency, he had a more universal message that hit the nail on he head, even if it was very bluntly (and briefly) done to a point. I think that was the deciding factor to me here in that PA had a verse that applied to the image directly and I am a fan of doing that. While I (largely) enjoy the mechanics of a verse and tend to favour those that do it over those that don’t - it’s not the be all and end all deciding factor for me in battles like this, and this battle is a good example of that. I think this one could largely come down to personal preference, and my own preference this round leans more toward what PA was able to put forward over what Sinacog has.
Vote - Pharoah’s Army
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