In an exclusive interview with Billboard, ATL trap star Jeezy delved inbto his short spat with Queensbridge king Nas over Nas’ 2006 controversial hit “Hip Hop Is Dead”, which many took as a shot taken at the South’s dominance over the genre.
Jeezy said that Esco’s peaceful conduct during their brief beef made such an impression on him that he followed his example during his feud and inevitable truce with Gibbs and eventually Rick Ross as well.
“When I realized that most of the time people act out, you don’t have to match energy and engage or react — because, at the end of the day, especially with the Freddie shit, it was just bad communication,” Jeezy said. “Same thing with Ross — just bad communication, and it took the right people to get in the mix.“
“What I have learned is the same when Nas did ‘Hip Hop Is Dead’ and I reacted. I was kinda spazzing out on the radio, if you remember. I’ll never forget when I got in the car from the radio station, somebody from Def Jam was like, ‘Nas wanna holla at you. He’s on the phone.’”
Back in 2011, Jeezy signed Freddie Gibbs to his CTE label before the Gary, Indiana rapper left on bad terms in 2012. The duo went on to exchange diss tracks, with Gibbs taking aim at his former label boss on 2014’s “Real” and Jeezy firing back years later on “Therapy For My Soul.”
Both men have matured since then, with Gibbs admitting on his $oul $old $eparately song “Rabbit Vision” that he was “too immature” during their feud.
