In the week since Kendrick Lamar upended the rap conversation by calling out a laundry list of rappers he considered his competitors and proclaiming himself the King of New York on Big Sean's song "Control," responses have been arriving at a steady clip. Pretty much every rapper nobody was waiting to hear from has chimed in with a track, as have most of the New YorkRappersWho FrequentlyRecord Freestyles, Lupe Fiasco and, naturally, Riff Raff.
Meanwhile, the rappers actually mentioned in the verse (a.k.a. The Actual Competitors, a.k.a. Kendrick's Frenemies) have, when asked, mostly offered some friendly words about how great Kendrick is, how it's just friendly competition and how it's good for hip-hop overall. None of them have really taken Kendrick up on his gentleman's game, per se. In fact, when A$AP Rocky stopped by Hot 97 today with the rest of the A$AP Mob to help promote A$AP Ferg's new album, Trap Lord, he simply added to the friendly banter, saying that Kendrick was "smoking crack," as we noted earlier today.
Clearly, he was leaving the real talking to Ferg.
In the second portion of A$AP Mob's appearance on Funkmaster Flex (skip to around 4:59), Ferg got on the mic to deliver a verse about the shot from Kendrick, which "barely grazed me, and it could have hit Rock." He goes on to question Kendrick's right to compare himself to 2Pac, drops a Schoolboy Q subliminal and calls himself the "new 50 Cent," adding "I will fucking Ja Rule you, boy." He also brings in Kendrick's muse Sherane and makes a Top Dawg jab while the rest of the A$AP Mob starts losing it in the booth. Like Kendrick, Ferg's voice here sounds vicious, like he's actually fighting back.
It still seems like mostly friendly fire, but this may be the first "Control" response with real teeth: It's certainly the closest we've come so far to something from someone Kendrick actually called out. It also doesn't hurt that it also comes from the one New York crew mentioned in the verse or that it's, quite frankly, really good.
This must be what that competition thing everyone kept talking about last week looks like.
Also check out A$AP Ferg on Complex TV's The Neighborhood below.
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