“This one guy, his name was Ed Stark, I do remember this one,” Bauman laughed. “He would just talk about guns and he wasn’t talented at rapping at all, so I made him posterboards and I put my verses on there and I read him my verses because I didn’t think he was worth my time. He was terrible. I’m not going to battle these people and give them the good s*** and then it doesn’t do anything for me. That’s stupid.”
A few years after Bauman was known for his rhymes and onstage antics, a Watts battle rapper rose to worldwide fame in the battle rap community for nearly the same shtick.
Daylyt has made himself known as one of the biggest “can’t miss” rappers in the history of battle rap. As skilled as he is lyrically, there’s an even bigger draw to his on-stage antics.
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Whether it’s pouring water on opponents’ sneakers, getting his entire face tattooed years before it was common for rappers and showing up in headless costumes, among many other things, you never knew what you’d be talking about when the battles ended.
In a lot of ways, Bauman is the Daylyt of MMA and he strongly feels he was the Daylyt of battle rap as well.
“I did a couple battles where I just did antics and people were pissed, like, ‘this guy’s actually really talented, this guy’s actually really the s***,’” Bauman said. “I was Daylyt before Daylyt. In Minnesota, that’s how people knew me.”
The battle rap flame dimmed out for Bauman and he turned his attention towards many other ventures, but the itch is starting to come back.
The dream of being big enough to pay battle rappers out of pocket and host the event himself are upon us. It’s only a matter of time before Bauman has the means and the platform to entice the A-List of the community to come make history.
“I’ll create my own s*** where I can actually battle the people that I want, give the performances that I want and it matters, and that’s where Fight For You comes in, that’s where my NFT comes in,” Bauman said. “Now we’ll be able to give these performances to those battle rappers.”
