We love a good beef. When Drake and Pusha T started trading shots, we watched with bated breath, and when Pusha absolutely annihilated Drake, we loved every second of it…even though Drake seems like a perfectly nice guy. Hey, don’t blame us; there’s something fun about watching successful people tear each other apart.
With that said, not all beefs are created equal. Over the last couple of weeks, a few high-profile celebrity beefs started up, sizzled, and faded away—and in case you’ve been living on some sort of island without internet, we’ll help you get caught up.
6ix9ine has started enough beef to open a steakhouse, and his newest is with Ludacris.
Tekashi 6ix9ine is known for two things: starting beefs with better rappers and going into tattoo shops, pointing at the entire display wall, and saying “put that on my neck.”
He’s exchanged words with YG, Trippie Redd, Casanova, Pi’erre Bourne, Game, Chief Keef, and now, Ludacris. We’re not listing all of his enemies, simply because we’re limited to, like, 12 pages of content, but the neon-haired rapper doesn’t seem to shy away from beef. Most of the time, he sends out a few Snapchats, slurs a few verses, and that’s the end of it.
But this week, Tekashi took aim at legendary Southern rapper Ludacris, and he might have finally bitten off more than he can chew. This all started when Luda appeared on MTV’s Wild ‘n Out, a hip-hop improv show that’s exactly as stupid as it sounds.
On the show, a 6ix9ine impersonator asked Luda whether he’d sign Nick Cannon or 6ix9ine. Luda’s response wasn’t too kind, but it wasn’t really that bad, either.
#6ix9ine doesn't have a chance in @Ludacris's eyes 😂 | You don't want to miss TWO back to back episodes of #WildNOut TOMORROW at 10/9c on @MTV! 👀 pic.twitter.com/0uj3QvLLvw
— Wild 'N Out (@WildNOut) August 23, 2018
“That’s an easy one for me. I’d sign Nick Cannon, ’cause Tekashi, I don’t know how much longer he gon’ be around,” Ludacris said.
That prompted an immediate (and stupid) response from 6ix9ine, who went on Instagram to run an instant poll on his fans: “Who’s more lyrical? 69 or Luda?”
😂 🤔 📸 @6ix9ine @ludacris pic.twitter.com/fpUvRYa5Vg
— SOHH (@sohh) August 24, 2018
If the question was, “Whose hair glows in the dark,” “Whose dentist hates him more,” or “Who could play the villain in a live-action Trolls movie,” Tekashi would win easily. Luda shot back on Instagram—while promoting his LudaDay music weekend in Atlanta—by noting that 6ix9ine is “not confirmed” for the concert.
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bm1yFHkDnFn
Tekashi also released a stream of Instagram videos mocking Ludacris’ incredibly successful career, taking shots at Ludacris’ relationship with Justin Bieber and his appearances in the Fast and Furious movies. You know your beef is weak when you’re mocking your opponent for making millions of dollars before you even bought your first industrial-sized bottle of green hair dye.
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bm12u-DFoJC/
It’s perhaps the worst beef in 6ix9ine’s long career of bad beefs, although it’s not quite as embarrassing as the time that he flopped around in a swimming pool to “diss” YG.
[Warning: The video below contains a near-constant stream of NSFW language and shows 6ix9ine splashing around a swimming pool like a toddler.]
https://youtu.be/e-OfykhH938
And Tekashi isn’t the only rapper feeling some type of way about “Wild ‘n Out.”
The show—which, again, is absolutely unwatchable—has started an unlikely beef between Azealia Banks and Nick Cannon. TMZ reports that the whole thing started when DC Young Fly joked that Banks was appearing on the show because Cannon couldn’t land Cardi B.
The joke is that Cardi B is a much more popular female rapper than Banks (which is, uh, true). Once again, it’s a pretty tame joke, but it was enough to prompt a nuclear response from Banks.
The Azealia Banks episode of Wild N Out comes on NEXT WEEK. 💀💀💀 #WildNOut
— Nne Mmiri (@SosoTheWanderer) August 18, 2018
“Some little scrawny black Atlanta tw**k was prepared for me,” she said on social media, using a homophobic slur that we don’t want to reprint here. “They planned this—hit me on short notice, told me I didn’t have to participate in the c**n ass freestyle battles, (not my style) and I was to sing my song and go home.”
If there was an award for overreacting to a mild insult, Banks would win it, and her acceptance speech would probably last 10 hours.
Being an Azealia Banks stan is an extreme sport.
— CEO of Yelling (@ChantayyJayy) August 23, 2018
To be fair, she also took issue with some of the hosts’ jokes, which she described as colorist. That’s a fair criticism, but you sort of lose the moral high ground when you use a bunch of anti-minority slurs in your response.
Banks also criticized Cannon personally, and he responded by saying that he was “praying for [her].” Still, he didn’t quite take the high road, adding “She #Wildnout for real #Karma” to the end of his post.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BlQmxGonvf-/
We should note that the format of Wild ‘n Out —a truly terrible show that nobody should ever watch—prompts contestants to insult each other, so Banks should have known what she was getting into.
Meanwhile, Nicki Minaj is basically having a complete breakdown about Travis Scott.
Oh, Nicki. We remember when you were arguably the hottest rapper in the world. Your “Monster” verse is legendary. Please don’t do what you’re doing right now.
Here’s the thing: Everyone loses clout over time. Even if you’re Jay Z, you’re not going to outsell Drake after a certain point in your career, and that’s totally fine. All warriors need to become wise men (or women). For 35-year-old Nicki Minaj, that’s not going to be an easy transition.
Nicki’s Queen sold the equivalent of 185,000 album units in its first week, per Billboard, which gave the rapper the #2 album in the country. That’s nothing to sneeze at; in fact, it’s Minaj’s fourth top-two charting album, the most of any female hip-hop artist. However, she didn’t react well to taking second place to Travis Scott’s Astroworld, releasing a stream of angry tweets criticizing Scott’s marketing methods.
I put my blood sweat & tears in writing a dope album only for Travis Scott to have Kylie Jenner post a tour pass telling ppl to come see her & Stormi. lol. Im actually laughing. #Queen broke the record of being number 1 in 86 countries. Thank Jesus & thank you to my fans.
— BEAM ME UP SCOTTY MIXTAPE OUT NOW‼️🎀🦄♥️ (@NICKIMINAJ) August 19, 2018
Nevermind the fact that she also used merchandise bundles to sell her record. She followed up on her Twitter rant with a real-life rant on her radio show (during which she called Scott the “hoe n***a of the week”), and she also told TMZ that she’s the “new Harriet Tubman.”
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bm1hEKCB2VX/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
Harriet Tubman, by the way, was an abolitionist who risked her life countless times to free slaves via the Underground Railroad. Nicki Minaj’s most famous single contains the line, “Hands up, touch the sky, can’t stop cause we’re so high / We’re higher than a mother****er,” so we can see how they’re sort of the same.
And just when you thought that things couldn’t get much worse for the self-proclaimed queen…
Live Nation announced that her tour with rapper Future would be postponed.
“Nicki Minaj has decided to re-evaluate elements of production on the NickiHndrxx Tour,” the company said. “Due to scheduling conflicts, Future will not be on the North American run. Nicki Minaj will be announcing new North American dates to kick off in May 2019.”
According to Nicki, the postponement occurred because she’d pushed her album back two months.
My darlings: 🙏🏽 pic.twitter.com/nBmsE2p9SI
— BEAM ME UP SCOTTY MIXTAPE OUT NOW‼️🎀🦄♥️ (@NICKIMINAJ) August 22, 2018
“I just finished writing and recording literally hours before the album came out,” she said in a video posted to her social media accounts. “Now, I just simply don’t have the time to rehearse and be on the road in time to give you guys the level of a show I need to give.”
That’s her story, but rumors immediately began circulating that low ticket sales forced Live Nation to take action.
“Nicki’s tour ticket sales were not just in the toilet, they were totally down the drain. There was no way the tour could go forward,” a Live Nation source reportedly told Page Six.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BmSVeKwBROI/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
“Nicki’s tour looked to be the most disappointing ticket sales of the year for any artist. She and Future were booked in big arenas with around 20,000 capacities.”
The source said that sales in several major cities didn’t top the 4,000 marks. That’s…not ideal.
Somehow, Kylie Jenner is now involved in the whole Nicki-Travis thing.
Kylie, of course, is Scott’s partner, and they’ve got a child together. You’d think that she’d be solidly in Scott’s camp…and you’d be right. She posted her support for Astroworld on Instagram, because, duh, of course she did.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BmjTmptgpzl
But Kylie stopped short of clapping back at Nicki, which might have stopped this beef from reaching another level. During a red carpet appearance for Queen Radio, Nicki confirmed to reporters that she had no problem with Kylie (or, for the record, any member of the Kardashian clan).
“I f*cking love Kylie and so do my fans,” the “Anaconda” rapper said. “Kim [Kardashian] was on my first episode of Queen Radio—f*cking love her. We’re not going to make something that it’s not. We’re not going to start any dumbass cat fights for your entertainment. This is strictly music, between musicians…She supported her man like she should. Me and my fans are not feeding into this.”
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bm1a4tKBN5G/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
Meanwhile, Ariana Grande might be getting involved—sort of. During a recent concert, she told her fans to buy her recent record Sweetener, noting that “We got three days left. You don’t know what Travis could pull!”
https://twitter.com/ThatsSoBeyoncee/status/1032488431862145025
However, Grande later posted on Twitter that it was just a joke, noting that she adores Travis and Kylie and loves Astroworld.
i adore travis & kylie and i love the astroworld album a joke issa joke watch the video, stop using me for clickbait so i can come online n celebrate my number one too pls ! hip hip hooray !
— Ariana Grande (@ArianaGrande) August 23, 2018
With that said, it’s hard not to interpret her comments as a joke on Nicki’s overreaction to getting the #2 spot. Should anyone care? No, probably not. But at least this beef seems a little more fleshed out than whatever 6ix9ine is up to.
Tekashi, call us when you start drawing Kardashians into your temper tantrums. Until then, we’re going to go listen to Astroworld and try to figure out what all the hype’s about.
