If you went into a 20-year coma in 2004 and woke up today, you might be forgiven for thinking that no time at all had passed. The economy is still all topsy-turvy, the US is still embroiled in controversial conflict in the Middle East, and for some reason, Eminem is still beefing with Benzino, despite both men being well into their fifties.
The first salvo in their latest skirmish was fired by Eminem on his song “Doomsday Pt. 2” from Lyrical Lemonade’s new album All Is Yellow.
Benzino responded on Wednesday (January 31) with his new single “Rap Elvis.”
Em has yet to respond, but at this point, you kind of have to expect that he will. The real question you might have is… Why? Why do Eminem and Benzino have beef in the first place, and why haven’t they let it go after nearly 30 years?
The answer to the second question is only known to the two rivals, but as to when their feud began and what started it, here’s a short summary. In 2002, The Source was still largely considered “hip-hop’s Bible,” and then-publisher Benzino refused to allow the magazine to give Eminem’s album The Eminem Show a five-mic rating — at least, according to Eminem and widely accepted hip-hop lore. Em criticized the magazine for what he felt was an unfair rating of his best album (to this day), prompting Benzino to respond with the diss song “Pull Your Skirt Up.”
Benzino’s campaign to undermine Eminem also unearthed old recordings using slurs against Black people that the Detroit rapper made when he was a teenager. Eminem apologized for those recordings, but not the scathing diss tracks he unleashed against Benzino, which included “The Sauce” and “Nail In The Coffin.” Since then, you could say the both men’s paths divereged a bit; while Eminem’s legacy as a “Rap God” has grown over the course of seven more albums (arguably a little too much), Benzino has been known in recent years largely for his role as a cast member on Love & Hip Hop: Atlanta and his fraught relationshp with daughter Coi Leray.
Until this year, the beef was mostly one-sided, with Benzino shading Eminem in interviews and on Twitter throughout the past half-decade or so, and Eminem mostly just ignoring him. That changed with “Doomsday, Pt. 2,” which could mean that 2024 looks like 2004 all over again. Maybe this time, Em and Ben can make sure that the coffin stays closed.