Hov on God Did: Best Rap Verse of 2022

Image is screenshot from my music player

Maybe you've heard the song, maybe you haven't, but if you fall in the latter category then you must have missed out on one of the most incredible verses delivered by one of the greatest in the game.

God Did is the album title song off Dj Khaled's critically acclaimed album (God Did) of 2022. The song features rap heavyweights like Lil Wayne, Rick Ross and Jay Z. It starts with the Khaled setting the stove for the fireworks that was to be unleashed on wax. Rozay hopped on the heavy kicks dominated beat, bouncing off the rhythm like a juvenile on a new mattress.

"Time to say our prayers" the Maybach kingpin announced before admonishing us to bow our heads as he lead the way in the prayer session. The rest of the wordings were an exquisite painting of self made riches that would make the poor and needy contemplate suicide.

More artistry followed with Wayne lending his voice to the glorification of God's creativity, rapping "God did his thing when he made me". With the ambience saturated and dripping with chords and snares, the rapper waltzed around unhinged while playing around with his words floating seamlessly in the air to the cadence of the beat.

By the time he got to "I pray more and say less, God did the rest", one could have been excused for expecting that God is to come next and wrap up the session with answers to the prayers. And what followed next was testament to that will.

Jay Z, oozing the confidence and swagger of one given the opportunity to free his mind of his sins, took that notion and created arguably the most spectacular verse of the year 2022. "Hov did" is the opening sentence, heralding the arrival of the god who has done it. But knowing his boundaries, the rapper begins by pleading to God for forgiveness "for what the stove did".

Now this isn't like every other rap verse where the rapper goes on a Lyrical assault, directing his punches at the beat and trying to destroy everything in its wake. This is an OG talk aimed at self glorification and the display of capacity through a journey of adversity and trials that eventually culminated in the emergence of the first music billionaire crib.

A crib which according to the rapper has also created 4 more billionaires in "me, Ri and Ye/ Ron's a rock boy, so four technically" he boasted in an authoritative manner. If there's ever been a standard for big boys' talk, Jay completely destroyed the roof here to set new unprecedented standards.

He swerved from the outcome of his journey and staggered back to the beginning of the race and the tracks and hurdles he and his goons had to scale to get to where he is now. A veteran of the game who had to navigate the dangerous waters of the illegal to emerge on the other side of the legal money by "turning the cocaina into champagne".

At some point in the song, it seemed the beat was an unwanted emcumberance accompanying the veteran on his microphone talk where his anger was poured out on the crooked system which has evolved to now warrant the legal sales of the same products which they were prosecuted for, while referring to them as going corporate, but to the veteran, "they're just corner boys with the corner office".

The breaking down of this verse in itself is a cumbersome as every word in every line "speaks to the souls of men" with different layers of truth and meanings that could be peeled off. The rendition had a seamless flow that sizzles with energy, power and free spirit. The legend brought the game to the beat and seems to imply that he should be treated as the real baron of the game because "Jesus turned water into wine, for Hov, it just took a stove".

There were numerous beautiful bodies of work throughout last year in the rap scene, but when it come to the sheer dominance of a verse by a particular artiste, none comes close to Jay Z's on God Did. He completely dismantled the beat structure and built his verbal empire on it, and he did it without breaking a sweat.

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