By Jeremy Binning
The hip hop community hasn’t been this divided since the mid-90s with the infamous rivalry between hip-hop legends, Tupac and The Notorious B.I.G. As many remember how that played out, both rappers were murdered 6 months apart and seemingly ended the east coast/west coast rivalry that their feud had started. The recent tension between rappers Lil Durk and NBA YoungBoy have been making weekly headlines with both constantly attacking each other on social media and in their songs.
The rivalry stems from an altercation that occurred in November of 2020, when Lil Durk’s cousin King Von, who was also signed with Durk’s label, was fatally gunned by an affiliate of YoungBoy’s label, Lul Tim. Tim was arrested and charged with the murder after video footage from a camera outside the club they were at showed the entire altercation. Von was on the verge of attacking another rapper that was there, Quando Rondo, after the two appeared to trade shots online just a week before. Rondo is also an affiliate of YoungBoy and is also signed to his label.
Lul Tim was released after beating the murder charge two weeks after the incident because he claimed it was in self-defense and the video footage proved so. Upon his release, Quando Rondo and Lul Tim faced much backlash for the murder because of how big King Von’s following was. Constantly going back and forth with Durk and his crew for the next year, the media quickly began picking sides, only increasing the tension. Youngboy was released from jail in late October of 2021 and stayed quiet for much of the first few weeks after coming home.
However, things began to heat up when he dropped a diss track aimed at Durk and his crew called “I Hate YoungBoy” where he also disses other rappers in affiliation with Durk.
“I thought he should have stayed quiet and let it die down instead of reigniting the flame,” Jonathan Cromartie, senior at Dominican College, said.
Durk would respond a few weeks later with his song “AHHH HA” which would also be the lead single for his latest studio album “7220”.
Destiny Martinez, a senior at Hunter College, explains how the current situation between the two has affected hip-hop.
“The publicity that has come from this has brought both of their names up,” Martinez said. “The fact other rappers are getting involved, I feel like it’s only going to make things worse and that’s detrimental to the hip-hop community.”
Other artists have responded to YoungBoy, such as Gucci Mane, who dropped “Publicity Stunt” in early March. The ongoing feud has already had more violence added after the Von murder with Tim being shot in the stomach, which he would survive, in the summer of 2021. The feud has no end in sight and both artists don’t seem to be slowing down anytime soon. Both artists have since been quiet on social media as YoungBoy is still under house arrest in his Colorado home and is awaiting trial for his federal gun charge. Durk recently dropped his album 7220 this past week and is sitting comfortably at number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts.
well since you seem well uninformed ill make it short von and youngboy been had tension von died the beef passed on to durk, durk was sneak dissing youngboy when he was in jail youngboy got out and returned shots but direct ones and now they’re back and forward with it
This article is inaccurate in many ways.