Given what we know about the decades of rap beefs that have come and gone, you need venomous bars in order to give yourself a chance to win. There also needs to be some clever word play involved as well as a solid song structure. It can't just merely be a string of disses and an aggressive beat, especially when the competition is fierce.
But for the most part, West Coast rapper Symba did the reverse on his new song "Father Figure." Leaked by DJ Hed and produced by Conductor Williams, the song is meant to be a response to what he felt was a diss by J. Cole on his Blizzard Birthday '26 EP.
His North Carolina counterpart allegedly takes aim at Symba on the track "Bronx Zoo Freestyle." He raps, "Y'all toddlers to me, stop bothering me / Young Simba, some n****s threw some hate my way / But only thing they should say is, 'Cole, you like a father to me.'"
Fans have argued that it's not a shot at Symba as Cole has repeatedly mentioned The Lion King character a lot, especially in the early stages of his career.
But regardless, Symba felt it was necessary to respond. How he's gone about it may upset those looking for fireworks. But folks who perhaps have a more nuanced view on the genre are giving Symba their respect.
Do Symba & J. Cole Have Beef?
Instead of retaliating intypical rap beef fashion, Symba clearly approached this song by aiming to deliver his honest thoughts on Cole. Once again, he revisits how he should have just stayed in the Kendrick Lamar-Drake battle from the start instead of bowing out.
However, it's the concept of the song that's really winning people over. Symba responds to the father figure bar by saying that rap as a whole is his dad but that it's also Cole's. He gives fans nuanced lines about when it caught his attention and how it developed him as a man.
His third verse is when he directly replies to him. But in the end, he reaffirms that it's all love and that he's merely calling it how sees it based on what the rap game taught him over the years.
Symba kind of teased the direction of "Father Figure" in a phone call with Rory and Mal last week. "I'm pulling up to the studio, and I think you know what I'm gon' do... He's more of a cousin than a father, but we'll get to that pretty soon. I will say this: I took that as a sign of respect. For him to mention me, for him to take the time to address that, it's all we ask for in hip-hop... But you're not my father. My father shot at police. He don't duck smoke."
But he did also clarify that he's ready to hear Cole on The Fall-Off in what's potentially the latter's swan song.
