URLTV: NOME 14 RECAP

We don’t always have the main events and “dream battles” live up to the lofty expectations we place upon them. It’s hard for things to be as special as people hope them to be, to live up to the bright lights, stage, and attention.

Loaded Lux vs Rum Nitty was not one of those battles that had a problem being what everyone wanted it to be. It matched every expectation and possibly even surpassed them.

This battle feels like an instant classic and, on the night of, felt like something that was clearly special. From Rum’s monster 1st round, Lux was able to take control of the room in the 2nd, and all the smaller details in between. But when you have guys like Nitty and Lux, who are also so impressive with multiple watches, this battle will only get better with time and will already stand out more and more.

Lux’s first isn’t as explosive as his two later rounds would be, but it’s still full of excellent writing and slick wordplay that, from the start, made this the most I had enjoyed Lux in a long time. Besides revisiting some of the Wal-Mart topics, Lux wasn’t very angle-heavy in his first either, which was a welcome sight for me. I didn’t want either guy to come into this overthinking it.

While Lux’s first feels like more of a slow walk approach, Nitty dropped an absolute bomb of a first-round on Lux. Even for the sky-high standards we hold Nitty to, this round was stellar. Watching it on Saturday, I felt like Nitty’s first went on a tad longer than it needed to and that he was getting close to over-rapping. But watching it more since then, I think every bar here is either great or phenomenal all the way down to the end. It also felt clear immediately how well-rested and focused Nitty was. Absence does make the hard grow fonder in a lot of ways, and with only seeing Nitty once so far this year up until this battle, there was a renewed excitement and energy. 

This segment of his round was my favorite from Rum:

“I saw killings

Pops gone, I got dead homies, I wish I could see my moms livin’

I’m God fearin’

Sometimes I talk to myself like, “Look at you emotional”, cause I done really lost niggas

And all that I got left is to stare at they photo on the wall, the large picture

Let me talk witchu

They gave me one rule

“All that punchin’ ain’t gon’ cut it. You gon’ have to body Loaded with substance”, like a drug mule

I got a ton, fool

Get murdered urgent, I’m sure you heard it

I said, “Body Loaded like a drug mule”

Cause you about to Get This Work in person”

With how potent Nitty’s round was and how relatively unimpactful Lux’s was, Lux needed to respond with bombs, or that deficit could have become too much to overcome. And Lux did just that. Early on, with “You can’t talk down to real kings ’bout crowns wit’ false teeth”, Lux had my attention, and he only got better from there. When Lux is in the zone, his word association and wordplay are nearly unmatched. There’s some angling here. Lux touches on Nitty’s different crews and his status in battle rap, but this battle, maybe more than any of Lux’s work in the modern era, felt the most like him focusing on flexing his rapping ability the way he did in things like his infamous Hot 97. It’s not 2003 anymore; “grey hoodie” Lux might not be a thing again. But this round felt like the closest thing to it that we might ever get. Just look at how long he stays on this long E ending rhyme:

“And you just keep gettin’ away with this shit

It’s pure robbery

You wacker than a hit from a mob beat, this shit is ungodly

How can you put all that conviction into that fiction, like that man?

It’s beyond me

It just don’t hold my soul, it don’t pump wit’ the heartbeat

You can’t talk down to real kings ’bout crowns wit’ false teeth

Man brace (embrace) yaself, that don’t make the cut

They think you sharp, me?

What I’m ‘posed to draw from a nigga straight lyin’ (line)

That’s not a Harvey?

At best that’s an erasable Sharpie

This a one on one you bring ya whole Family to the Feud

Son, Think Like A Man if you gon’ be on top shinin’, that’s Steve with the baldy

But this how you come across

Peep

“Drive-by, never-ending cycle

Ghostrider on the Harley

The stick out, ketchup stains at an all white party”

And this is all before he even really lands any bombs. Lux is incredible in this round, in my opinion, it’s the best rapping he’s done since the Hollow da Don battle. And yeah that’s a limited sample size, but he’s that special here. The music scheme, “fuck it lets get abducted”, more staying on the same rhyme for several bars at a time, even throwing some internal rhymes. It’s masterful work from him. And I’ll eat crow and admit that I wasn’t too sure about Lux coming into this battle. The Geechi battle was the biggest red flag, but I didn’t love his material against Surf. I wasn’t sure about the motivation level for Nitty, especially seeing Lux showing much more interest in a Hitman Holla battle. But he answered all of my doubts and showed why he’s the legend that he is.

Because of the highlight Lux’s round is, it might get glossed over but Rum’s second round isn’t all that far off from his first. His moments playing off some of Lux’s famous bars like the “this for my niggas…” or the scheme with the palindromes referencing Lux’s “evil to live backward,” Nitty didn’t take a step down or gas out in the first, we just saw Lux reach the vintage form. To Nitty’s credit, too, his crazy punches aren’t “just” gun bars either; you can tell there was a concerted effort from Nitty to find the balance between staying true to what brought him to the dance but knowing he had to make slight adjustments not to allow his pen to be overshadowed.

The third, I felt like, was the biggest toss-up of the battle. Lux was still great but not as dominant as his second round felt. Still, though, the momentum from the second clearly carried over to the third. Rum’s third feels shorter and maybe a little rushed compared to his other two rounds, but I still liked the content, and his Paid in Full/Surf RICO bar was my favorite bar from either guy in this round. Ultimately I think Lux did enough in snatching the battle away to come out of it feeling like he got the upper hand, but it’s a battle that’s so great it’s beyond a winner and a loser.

A perfect cap to a successful night of battles and something where we got the best possible outcome. This battle is probably still great on a big stage, but opting for a more intimate environment was the perfect call for this battle. Getting to just focus on these two all-time-level writers flexing their skills in what could wind up being the biggest battle of the year is what a lot of us want from battles sometimes. The big stage is great. It shows who the real stars are, it gives us timeless moments, and the energy of a packed venue can be infectious. But sometimes the small room is the right place to be. 

Mook’s performance against Tay Roc, Rex’s performance against Chess, Reed’s performance against Nitty and now Lux’s performance against Nitty. As much as they’ve adjusted to newer times, our older legends do feel like they’re more at home in settings like these. Yeah, I know, with their names and the attention they command, you want to book them in bigger venues to capitalize on the drawing power and make money back, but in terms of being conducive to battle quality, maybe the answer is right in front of us.

Having phenomenal showings back to back from Lux and Mook shows that as much shit that others or myself might give them when they’re not great, they’re competitors and still can learn and adjust. They’re our legends for a reason. They transcended the medium and became logos of the sport. And sometimes, that means they get leeway in ways that frustrate me. But other times, we watch them electrify a room in ways few can achieve. I don’t know what’s next for Lux. There seems to be more steam behind Hitman Holla vs Murda Mook right now (and if I’m honest, I do prefer Hitman vs Mook), so I’m left wondering what I’d like to see Lux do next, but after seeing him turn in this level of performance, the main thing just has him back in general.

Lux is admittedly Rum’s end-game battle. He’s not shy in mentioning or highlighting the influence Lux had on him as a battle rapper. For someone who has been a headliner for NOME several times, this still felt like the biggest battle of Nitty’s career. And he didn’t falter under the lights one bit. He stepped up to the plate in ways that an all-time great should and proved to anyone who, for some reason, had any doubt that he truly is one of the best to ever do this. So many years were spent on the things Nitty didn’t have on his resume and why it kept him from a certain echelon. But after NOME 14, there should be no questions anymore about where Rum Nitty belongs.

Ultimately, the battle will be debated till the end of time, which is all the markings of a classic. If I had to choose a winner……