The State of Hip-Hop Address: Cleveland, Ohio is Ground Zero in the Battle for Authentic Hip-Hop

Malik X views battle footage at R Squared Studios. Cleveland, OH: January 13, 2024.

On the near westside of Cleveland, on Thursday, January 11, 2024, dozens of lovers of Hip-Hop gathered to witness a duel between two wordsmiths. No one knew that this event would be both powder keg and canary in a coal mine for all who claim Hip-Hop as their craft and culture. 

Abstract

This essay explores the relationship between regional cultural standards, and our main cultural export as black people in the United States of America. That primary cultural export, according to one Sister India Arie, is that infamous musical phenomenon we know as Hip-Hop. Based on the unfolding of events in Northeast Ohio’s underground Hip-Hop scene, as well as certain issues coming to an existential threshold in the broader music and social media mainstream, I argue that the city of Cleveland is the breeding ground for the return of the principles of authentic Hip-Hop. Wittingly or unwittingly, SCENE Magazine’s 2023 Best of Cleveland Hip Hop Artist list contained some explosive material spurring much debate and discussion in the city’s underground music scene about the need to re-evaluate the standards of practice within the genre.

Origin Story

Autumns in Cleveland are characterized by the region’s love for good storytelling, and the fall of 2023 was no exception to this. What made that season particularly noteworthy was the mainstream media’s open celebration of Hip-Hop music, heralding 2023 as the 50th anniversary of the culture and craft. All across the country, bars, venues, theaters, libraries, magazines, and television networks offered up tributes to the beloved artform, from Academy Tavern to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame to the syndicated BET Awards. In the face of such phenomena as Rolling Stone declaring Sexxy Red’s “SkeeYee” the No. 1 Hip-Hop Song of the Year, many lovers of Hip-Hop believe that the long- treasured artform is dying.  In Northeast Ohio that same season, SCENE Magazine’s “Best of Cleveland ” Awards were determined by the readership’s vote, and included such categories as ‘Best Arts Event,’ ‘Best DJ,’ and Best Hip-Hop Artist or Group, among many others in various categories. 

The origin of the conflict is embedded in the latter category, which listed the following as the city’s top three up-and-coming rappers, listing TobyRaps in first place, Koby Kolgate in second, with one Marquis Storm placing third. Malik X, an MC who was thrice nominated for a spot on the list between 2020 and 2023, yet never placed on the list, took the situation to the public square. On December 4, 2023, Malik X posted footage from a November interview produced by the Locally Grown Podcast, during which he performed a freestyle laying out his grievances with the SCENE results. First of these issues was that Koby Kolgate, the 2nd place winner, was self-admittedly inactive in 2023, and has been quoted by Malik X expressing “confusion” as to why he was on the list at all. Malik X then critiqued Marquis Storm placing third on the list, not because he hadn’t heard his music, but rather because he had, and he was not impressed.

Savage Royale, founder of StreamSpace, at R Squared Studios for battle debrief and footage review. Cleveland, OH: January 13, 2024.

Malik expressed these sentiments in his December 4th freestyle, to which Marquis Storm responded under the same Instagram post that he was a superior rapper to Malik X, and always would be. Malik X responded to Marquis Storm’s claims in a song called “The Storm.”  Soon after, upon hearing word that Marquis was preparing to respond with his song “Death Note,” Malik fired back with his song “Return to Sender.” In the midst of this freestyle frenzy, drummer and producer Savage Royale saw an opportunity to bring this debate to the streets to let the people decide who truly represents the Land. And thus, The Land Rap Champs Premiere was brought to fruition in Cleveland’s musical underground.

The Battle

Malik X describes that day as being “perfect,” saying, “I woke up that day, went for a jog. There was this light snow coming down and the weather was just perfect. It was a perfect Cleveland day. I just felt like the champion, like boxing, you know, like I’m about to go into battle, he says. “I had just heard that we had sold out that morning. I never sold out a show before.”

 Malik did not just sell out the show. According to the rapper, he feels he put on a “rap clinic,” and many artists in the Cleveland vanguard underground, such as Honasty Blade, and Khizzy of R Squared Studios, agree. According to Honasty Blade, the battle was indeed “unmatched,” but he accepted the opportunity to host the battle due to the history behind the battle. Ultimately, the truth of who was the superior MC would be revealed. For example, Malik X engaged the audience with his command of and confidence in his lyrics. In contrast, Marquis Storm not only forgot his lyrics in the last round but had already made critical blunders by the second round. One such blunder featured none other than Marquis Storm’s remix of Mobb Deep’s “Shook Ones,” in which he managed to completely misappropriate the lyrics of the original song, referring to himself as a “halfway crook” in the process.

However, Marquis Storm feels that the battle event was rigged, from the stage set up to the inclusion of a band that played for Malik X, but not for him as well, creating an automatic imbalance of power between the rappers. Malik X came with his own band, and since there was no agreement made about his band playing beyond Malik’s songs, several questions remain up for debate: What is the battle standard of practice in Cleveland? What is the appropriate logistical response in an unmatched battle on the part of the artists, the organizing team, and the community at large? While discussion is still to be had in 2024 about these questions, one thing is certain: Malik X annihilated his competition, and lovers of real Hip-Hop won gold on the night of January 11, 2024.

The differences between the artists’ lyricism, preparation, stage presence, and crown interaction are palpable, and this can be viewed in the event footage, which can be viewed in the video link below. The battle footage, produced by Savage Royale of StreamSpace in collaboration with R Squared Studios, has a way of capturing the viewers’ attention, even if the viewer does not know the history of the conflict, so to speak.

The Land Rap Champs, hosted by StreamSpace. Marquis Storm (left) and Malik X (right), sporting a custom flak jacket specially produced by local designer, Sherby Gang. CODA, Tremont: Thursday January 11, 2024.

The Local can Inform the National, and what this says about Cleveland’s place in the Van Guard of Hip-Hop

Ohio is a peculiarly literary state, and Cleveland’s Hip-Hop scene is no stranger to this literary tradition. If anything, Cleveland Hip Hop was nurtured in the spoken word poetry scene throughout the 20th century, culminating in such feats as the 1996 Cleveland Adult Poetry Slam Team bringing home gold from the National Slam. The Heartland is known to house many literary greats, from Toni Morrison to Rita Dove to Dave Chapelle and Katt Williams. To illustrate, Langston Hughes, a resident of the Glenville neighborhood, has a literary influence that is still seen throughout the region by way of his student Julie Ezelle Patton, her student Daniel Gray Kontar, his contemporaries, R.A. Washington, Saul WIlliams, Kisha Nicole Foster, and many poets, musicians, storytellers and MCs who were under their tutelage. 

This is the underlying issue in the battle for Hip-Hop: we must not forget our roots, and the roots of our craft are community, truth, and resistance to oppression in how we style the struggle and tell our stories1. Hip-Hop, like any true art, cannot be contrived. One’s body of work must be nurtured like a child or a garden. It is not a costume. That is why Hip-Hop as a genre and culture takes on a different flavor in every city, yet the fundamentals of the craft remain the same. I argue that, given the organic development of Hip-Hop culture and practice in the 1960s and 70s, part of returning to our roots is learning to appreciate our local creators, establishing standards of practice and performance, and encouraging competition among our brothers and sisters in the arts. In this way, we can reverse the curses and programs fed to us by legacy media by way of the very artforms our ancestors created for our own benefit. Therefore, I argue that what happens on a local level should affect the national culture much more than a national campaign affects local practices. 

Battle debrief with Honasty Blade (front) and E-Roc (foreground) at Cleveland’s R Squared Studios, Cleveland, OH: January 13, 2024.

So, what, then, are we to do, beyond the walls of the Vanguard Underground? Mainstream legacy media force feeds adults and children images of entitlement, unearned opulence, gaudiness, recklessness, and raunchy wanton behavior, programming generations even into adulthood to believe that this is a genuine representation of the black body politic. Mainstream Hip-Hop, in this regard, is in a sense void of the very thing that makes the genre what it is: artistic and scholarly excellence, authenticity, genuine confidence, savvy, and all these things being so, impeccable lyrical content. 

Cleveland is a city of artists, thinkers, and dreamers, with Sistine chapel visions bolstered by a blue-collar work ethic. In true Ohio tradition, it has produced all kinds of creative visionaries that have shaped American culture, artistic tastes, and even political and electoral outcomes. While the region may have a penchant for the arts, Ohioans at large, and Clevelanders in particular, are no stranger to hard times drenched in mundane fog.  The people of this land exist in the limbo of creative wanderlust and fly-over country. You can ask any art nerd from this state: that can be a dangerous combination if channeled improperly. However, that juxtaposition is the raw material from which Hip-Hop was born and progenerates. Therefore, it should be stated and understood that improper use of this unique artform has dangerous consequences. One such improper use of the artform of Hip-Hop would be to promote pathological behavior, such as sexual promiscuity and murder, for the purpose of obtaining notoriety and financial gain. Another improper use of the craft would be to pretend or “put on airs” as an artist. Among true lovers of Hip-Hop, this misuse of the craft can be spotted immediately. It is this type of craft misuse that became the subject of a fiery Rustbelt battle on that cool January night. 

According to the legacy media, 2023 was the 50th anniversary of Hip-Hop. Per the record of the syndicated Rolling Stone Magazine, the year’s top three songs within the genre were Sexxy Red’s “SkeeYee,” Latto and Cardi B’s “Put It on the Floor,” and Ice Spice’s “Deli.”

In that same season, Cleveland’s SCENE Magazine published a heavily disputed top three local rappers list that, according sources online and on the ground, was an inaccurate representation of Cleveland artistry and dedication to the craft. What these situations hold in common is an underlying battle for the soul and truth of the genre that is Hip-Hop. Not only is legacy media (BET, Ebony Magazine, Rolling Stone) selling us a distorted narrative of the origins of this artform; the artform itself has been hijacked, repackaged, and sold back to us as a bastardization of the genre. The state of Hip-Hop, which originated among poets and musicians in the 1960s, is today a far cry from its roots. Much has occurred within the genre’s history that requires the repairing hands and keen wit of today’s artists. These are the reasons why Hip-Hop lovers on the ground are so dissatisfied with what legacy media on a national and local level has to say about what Hip-Hop is truly. The allegorical cat is out of the bag regarding the tacit acceptance of mediocrity that plagues our airways and is promoted on syndicated stages like the Grammy Awards. The battle between Malik X and Marquis Storm embodied these issues on a local, microcosmic level, and that is why, as Cleveland artists coming out of the black literary tradition, it is time to put boots on the ground in each of our own camps, elevating only those dedicated to excellence and ingenuity in their craft. 

The battle for authentic Hip-Hop continues. Our culture is how we see ourselves, and now is the time we take ours back.

Stay tuned as this story continues to develop, and for more stories sprouting up from the vanguard underground here at the Antigone Project.

Published Friday, March 1, 2024, by Eva May Barrett.