Almost one week to the day of the historic beat battle that took place between Swizz Beatz and Just Blaze in New York City, two more legendary producers squared off.
Pete Rock and DJ Premier had their own contest on Saturday night (March 4) at Sidebar in Miami, Fla. Not relying on the same rules as Swizz and Just, who went back and forth playing songs they each produced in a one-upsmanship, Premo and “The Chocolate Boy Wonder” focused on getting the crowd hyped with whatever record they wanted, regardless of artist or producer. They even brought out a surprise: Talib Kweli to perform “Get By.” And DJ Premier got Pete Rock to rhyme when he played “The Creator.”
Premo started playing “Real Hip-Hop” by Das EXF then Pete Rock hit the audience with the “Jump Around” remix by House of Pain. Premier would counter with “Woo Hah” by Busta Rhymes and Pete retorted with Main Source’s “Looking At The Front Door.” And that was just the warm up.
“Yo Pete,” DJ Premier said. “What up?,” Pete answered.
“We got a little less than an hour left. I think it’s time to start going record for record. Song for song. Whatever you play, I’ll bounce off you. We’re going to go record for record. Rest in peace to James Brooownn! Rest in peace to Clyde ‘Funk Drummer’ Stubblefield.”
Pete then went into “A-Yo,” a record he produced for Redman and Method Man. DJ Premier played Run-DMC’s “Sucker MCs” as a follow-up. Rock leveled up with the remix he produced for Das EFX, “Real Hip-Hop” and Premier hollered back with Gang Starr’s “Full Clip.” Later, Premier played with the treat code, telling the audience he had a big weapon he was going to fire off. “I can’t rap, but Pete Rock can rap,” Premo said. He then threw on “The Creator” by Pete Rock and C.L. Smooth using one of Rock’s own missiles against him. Pete smiled as he took the mic and rapped for the spectators and Premier even went in front of the turntables with his own mic and played hype man.
Last night, Premier posted footage on his Instagram page, talking about the event:
“MIAMI WAS DOPE LAST NIGHT AT THE PETE VS PREMIER BATTLE…,” he wrote. “TALIB KWELI CAME TO SAY WHAT’S UP AND WALKED AWAY SO I THREW ON “GET BY” and IT GOT SO WILD WE PASSED HIM THE MIKE AND IT WAS ON AND POPPIN’…DOPE CROWD! SHOUT TO THE CLUB SIDEBAR… SHOUT TO DJ HERON FOR BRINGING US OUT…”
Pete Rock posted a picture of himself and Premier on his own IG page saying the battle was a tie.
“We both won,” he wrote. “S/o to DJ Premier! Epic Show in Miami last night. Packed House.”