Benny The Butcher Talks Rap Beefs, J. Cole, Buffalo Wings & More
Benny The Butcher has made quite the name for himself in Hip-Hop. When the industry was headed in a trendy direction as far as content and sound, Benny along with his Buffalo brethren, Conway The Machine & Westside Gunn, stayed true to their sound.
Griselda Records, the label that Benny called home up until this year, harbored that hardcore, gritty rap vibe the game has been missing since the mid-90s to early 2000s. They really brought back an energy that we haven’t seen since the early days of Mobb Deep, Nas, & many other New York rappers from that era.
The best part of Benny The Butcher’s musical process is not just the “real” rap content but, the fact that he is so consistent with how he puts out music. I feel like when your favorite artist put out an album, you had to wait 2, maybe 3 years to get the next project. Benny pumps out projects every year, with multiple drops at times. He recently signed to the label that fathered rap music, to begin with in Def Jam, and his debut album under the label, Everbody Can’t Go & the album has received some great reviews from fans & critics alike.
Benny is currently on tour & stopped in Tampa to chat with Babs & I. It was the first time either of us had met him & he is a really good dude, who is exactly who he is on the records he raps on. We had a great conversation where we spoke about being on the Def Jam label, & leaving Griselda Records, after being there for so many years. We also had to have him weigh in on his good friend, J. Cole & the current diss song he put out against Kendrick Lamar, which he would end up apologizing for.
An overall great interview & his show in Tampa that same night was nothing short of epic. The energy at the Ritz in Ybor City was like nothing I’ve ever seen in the area for a “real rap” show. Can’t wait to have Benny come around the city again.
Check out our full interview below.
J. Cole: His 2023 Features Ranked
J. Cole’s 2023 feature run has been so insane we’re almost not upset with him for not dropping another album. So far this year, he has done seven features, many of which are not from hip-hop artists. Cole has challenged himself to work with artists in R&B, Afrobeats, dancehall, K-Pop, and more.
J. Cole Clarifies Feature Charge
A rumor that has been going around since 2019 has finally been debunked. In a conversation on Lil Yachty’s show A Safe Space Podcast, Cole clarified his 2019 lyric on Bia’s “The London” where he made a guest appearance.
“I left a flock of rappers dead and buried /A verse from me is like eleven birds/ Just did the math, that’s like two thousand dollars every word,” he rapped on the track.
“A lot of my bars be really on point, but man that’s just a flex. I’m not gonna charge [artists] $2000 a word,” he told Yachty and his co-host Mitch.
The North Carolina rapper told Lil Boat that “does not even charge artists for a verse.” He agrees to be on artists’ songs if he’s “inspired to do it.”
Cole and Yachty worked together earlier this year on “The Secret Recipe.”
What’s Next For J. Cole?
Cole has been teasing his album The Fall Off for quite some time. This year alone, he has mentioned it in two of his guest verses. He first mentioned it in Summer Walker’s “To Cole From Summer.” The song is the intro to her EP Clear 2: Soft Life.
“The bitches that’s hatin’, they sit around waitin’ for you to fall off, like the album I’m makin,'” he raps.
The second time he references the album recently was in his verse for Drake’s “First Person Shooter” — the sixth track on For All The Dogs.
“I’m namin’ the album The Fall Off, it’s pretty ironic ’cause it ain’t no fall off for me,” Cole raps.
However, we don’t think that Cole is ready to hang it up just yet. In his feature on J-Hope’s “On the Street,” he set the premise for what he’s been doing all year.
“I contemplate if I should wait to hand over the crown/And stick around for a bit longer, I got a strange type of hunger/The more I eat, the more it gets stronger.”
Take a look at seven of his best features this year below: