Freestyle

Originally, as old school rapper Big Daddy Kane put it, freestyle was “a written rhyme on non-specific subject matter”. Nowadays freestyle is reffered to as “off the dome” or “off the top of the head” which means its rapping with no preparation. This improvisational rhyming skill is one that is acquired over time and can be very difficult. The practice of freestyle can create very impressive rappers and makes their flow and word selection a lot better. Games can be developed from this style of rapping like rap battles where two different people reply to each other with brief raps over a simple beat that “diss” or make fun of one another. A prime example of this is in the movie “8-Mile” starring Eminem and chronicles his come up to stardom with one of the more well known scenes of him rap battling a well known rapper in the area and Eminem beats him which puts Eminem into the mix of popular rappers in Detroit. Whoever runs out of material for raps first loses the battle proving that the more skilled rapper is the one who lasted the longest in “8-Mile”s case, Eminem.