Versus is the largest rap battle in Russia, it is a prototype of an American show on the Internet, during which participants participate in reading out pre-prepared fragments of texts in the style of rap and hip-hop, being opposite their opponent. In Russia, over 1 million 33 thousand people subscribed to the Versus Battle page on the Vkontakte social network. The same number of subscribers - on the YouTube channel.
Versus is rap without limits
In Russia, rap and hip-hop culture is inferior in scale to the American movement, and domestic performers of this genre have not yet become world-class stars such as Eminem or Jay-Z. Nevertheless, there are enough admirers of the "black quarter style" in the country - and recently, the possibility of conducting a speech duel between rappers has allowed expanding the horizons of this direction and involving hundreds of thousands of fans in the culture.
Stars participating in rap battles and performing at a decent level, secure a place on the hip-hop alley of glory in Russia.
In this regard, “Versus” is a kind of platform for splashing emotions through creativity, the ability to prove to oneself and fans of the genre that not everyone can worthily “read”.
A distinctive feature of this channel is the absence of lexical restrictions in expressions to his opponent within the round: that is, curses, insults and obscenities against the opponent in Versus battle are allowed if they are not immoral or calling for hostility on the basis of nationality. Such "punches below the waist" will not go unnoticed by the judges (most often there are three, but maybe five), and a participant with such a poor supply of vocabulary and inability to use them won’t win a battle.
A bit about the creator of the battle
The father of Versus is the restaurateur Alexander Timartsev, the permanent host of each issue on the channel and the main organizer of all meetings. He got his nickname due to the fact that the first battle was organized right at the workplace of Timartsev - in a restaurant.
Subsequently, he and his friends came up with the idea to transform the venture into something larger. And now "Versus" is a full-fledged, mature project that gave birth to such a star of rap and hip-hop industry as Noize MC.
Timartsev, without hesitation, openly says that the project does not yet bring millions of dollars, which many people mistakenly think - the reason for this is, of course, that this movement is only gaining momentum in Russia, and that the idea would bring its financial results, need to wait more than one year.
Versus: how much?
The rules of rap without rules are simple: there are always two participants in each battle, they know each other in advance. Each of them should prepare 3 passages (one in each round) with an appeal to their opponent and read them before the battle of words begins. As a rule, the form of appeal is “insult with taste”. The brighter, wiser, the sharper the participant’s reading, the more chances he will have to win.
Victory is awarded based on the decision of the judges, each of which is an expert in his case. But the results, as a rule, become clear to everyone even before the end of the battle - spectators who directly observe the process together with the restaurateur and the judges can support or boo the participant.
The most striking battles gain millions of views on YouTube, and are most often associated with the following participants: Oxxxymiron, Khovansky and Larin.
Fresh blood: rappers from the yard pump stadiums
To expand the boundaries of the battle and give a chance to novice rappers to become famous, the organizers created another platform for those whose name is known only in a narrow circle - "Versus: Fresh Blood". At the qualifying stage, the winner in this category is determined only by the viewer of the channel - which balances the chances of all novice artists and makes it possible to get instant popularity among fans of the genre.