One of the few bright spots during the COVID-19 pandemic has been watching the rise of Verzuz, the series of battles that started on March 24 when Swizz Beatz and Timbaland had an impromptu beat contest on Instagram Live. Since then, the superproducers have been hard at work pitting more producers and songwriters against each other in matchups that have delighted thousands of fans.

So far, we’ve seen showdowns like Hit-Boy vs Boi-1da, Sean Garrett vs. The-Dream, Johntá Austin vs. Ne-Yo, Scott Storch vs Mannie Fresh, and most recently Lil Jon vs T-Pain—with a DJ Premier vs RZA matchup on the way this weekend. Swizz said that his idea for the series harkens back to beat battles he had with Kanye West in 2008 and Timbaland in 2018 at Hot 97’s Summer Jam, and he’s been developing Verzuz with Timbo for the past three years. However, all of these battles actually recall a much older tradition: Sound Clash.

Sound Clashes started in the 1950s in Kingston, Jamaica, and predated the rise of genres like dancehall and reggae. In a sound clash, DJ crews known as “Sound Systems” have a head-to-head contest to win over the crowd. The audience shows their approval with a “Forward,” which can be anything from clapping to putting up a lighter to even firing a gun. The main figures of the battles were the “Selectors” who choose which songs to play. They didn’t just spin records though, the MCs would also clown the other crew, often calling weak selections a “drum pan sound.” The secret weapon Sound Clash were “dubplates,” exclusive tracks made just for the Clash.

Genius previously detailed the history of Sound Clash in 2017.

Sound Clash culture influenced the block parties that birthed hip-hop. DJ Kool Herc, who is often called the “Father of Hip-Hop,” was born in Kingston, Jamaica in 1955. His family migrated to The Bronx, New York when he was 12 years old. On August 11, 1973, DJ Kool Herc—influenced by the Sound Clashes of his native Jamaica—held the first hip-hop party at 1520 Sedgwick Avenue. Those parties in the Bronx became a phenomenon and eventually took over the world, inspiring the likes of Swizz Beatz and D-Nice who both grew up in the Bronx in the ‘70s and ‘80s.

“Sound Clashes have been something big in culture, especially living in the Bronx,” said Swizz Beatz, via a voice note. “Boston Road, it was all about the Sound Clash. Shoutout to Waggy Tee, Renaissance, Stone Love. That energy was there. Also in the Bronx, you had KRS-One vs MC Sham—these are iconic, legendary battles on wax. That set the tone and the energy coming from The Bronx.”

If you Clashing with Jamaican guys, they get so disrespectful.

— Boi-1da

The culture of Sound Clash, much like hip-hop, has evolved over the years but the basic idea has remained the same: a battle between two sounds, duking it out for ultimate bragging rights. There’s no denying that the 2020 quarantine version of battling over IG Live is going to be different from an IRL event in Jamacia or The Bronx, but there are some undeniable parallels.

“It’s definitely very comparable to Sound Clash,” said Boi-1da, who was born in Jamaica and grew up watching VHS tapes of Sting Sound Clashes like Bounty Killer vs. Beenie Man and his all-time favorite, Vybz Kartel vs. Mavado. “The rules of a Sound Clash are you play your hits, play your big tunes, and you battle your records against another person’s records and you talk sh*t. Afterward, it’s normal but when the clash is going on it’s straight beef. It’s been very much a Sound Clash vibe and it’s been that the entire Verzuz.”

Verzuz may not have full crews and sound systems (if there’s any major flaw in the IG battles it’s definitely the sound quality) but we certainly have Selectors. Thanks to Swizz and Timbaland’s hard work haggling all the egos and personalities, we’ve seen battles between both major names and behind the scenes players that have educated fans on the catalogs of all the artists involved. That’s why Swizz has referred to Verzuz as not just entertainment, but an “educational platform.”

In addition to Selectors, these battles have also drawn huge audiences—the steams regularly have over 100,000 viewers at a time, and sometimes even 250K. The audience may not be able to do a Forward by throwing their lighters up in a Sound Clash, but plenty of fans and celebrities have taken to the comments section to throw up a fire emoji for their favorite songs.

The comments section enables unique interactions. As Timbaland noted in an interview with Vibe, “We filling up a stadium, but a stadium where everybody can speak their minds.” While they can’t bust a shot on IG Live, few real-life Sound Clashes have probably had a moment as funny as when Kelly Rowland told a seemingly inebriated Sean Garrett, “Sean (I love you but) if you lick yo’ lips one more time.”

While Selectors and Forwards have some major variations, there are things that have remained the same. The first is the “drum pan sound” a.k.a. smack talk. Mannie Fresh may have lost to Scott Storch in their battle, but one way Mannie tried to get to the upper hand was by playing a series of skits, including fake news reports that about how Storch had gone on a cocaine bender and killed himself after foolishly challenging Fresh. At the moment it may have felt like a bit of a low blow to bring up Storch’s history of drug abuse and hold a mock funeral, but it’s well within the tradition.

“I would tell someone who has never been involved in a Sound Clash, don’t take it personally,” said Boi-1da, who added that Mannie’s antics showed he truly understood Clash culture. “If you Clashing with some Jamaican guys, they get so disrespectful. I remember seeing one where it was Popcaan and Wiz Khalifa, and Popcaan was like “F*ck Wiz Khalifa!” and Wiz’s face was like whoa. He was so confused. Wiz obviously wasn’t used to Clash culture, because in a Sound Clash they could say anything. It doesn’t mean anything, it doesn’t mean Pop hates Wiz, that’s just the battling sound. You have to kill that sound.”

1da isn’t the only one who says as much. In an article about the history of Sound Clash written in the Red Bull Music Academy, they wrote: “In sound system culture, you don’t lose. Rather, you die an often embarrassing, metaphorical death at the hands of your opponent: ‘sound bwoy fi dead.’” To his credit, Storch didn’t let Fresh’s jokes about his metaphorical death phase him and promptly retorted, “I see you brought the skits not the hits” before launching into more chart smashes.

Dubplate is like when somebody gets an artist to redo the song dissing the other sound.

— Boi-1da

The Storch/Fresh battle featured another key element that became part of Sound Clash culture in the 1980s. As that same Red Bull article notes, “Selectors would play the studio or vocal version before switching to the instrumental track for ‘part two,’ or the section where the DJ would get shine.” A similar move played out when Storch would add his own live keys to instruments to songs he worked on, like Justin Timberlake’s “Cry Me A River.” T-Pain followed suit, playing the live versions of his songs so he could sing along to them to remind the crowd that he is a true vocalist and not someone who solely relies on Auto-Tune as many believe.

Another aspect of these battles that can adapt well to IG Live is the use of exclusives. The best exclusives in the battles so far came courtesy of Hit-Boy and Boi-1da. Hit-Boy came through with an unreleased Big Sean and Nipsey Hussle song and Boi-1da played an unreleased collaboration between Drake and Roddy Ricch—tracks likely to make Sean and Drake’s upcoming albums. Meanwhile, The-Dream played the demo of JAY-Z’s “Holy Grail” featuring himself rather than Justin Timberlake. The next day, Dream’s version surfaced on TIDAL for fans to stream.

“If I was a producer, I would wait until after I played my 20 to play the exclusives,” said Swizz. “At the end, people can get a bonus during the after-party. Lil Jon and T-Pain did like an hour after and still had 170,000 people just hanging out, that’s how this Usher record that’s out now broke. I thought it was cool to see a record played during Verzuz and then, not even a week later, it’s available. That just added another way the Verzuz platform benefits the creatives.”

However, Boi-1da points out that an exclusive is not the same as a dubplate.

“Dubplate is like when somebody gets an artist to redo the song dissing the other sound,” explained Boi-1da, who brought the next best thing to his battle. “I pulled out the original Drake verse on [‘0 To 100’] he changed and said, ‘No disrespect to Hit-Boy, I got all the hits boy.’ I didn’t get Drake to redo anything, but I did have the old version of the record. I knew Hit-Boy was going to pull out that line, so I was like, ‘Yeah, I’m gonna have something to counteract that.’"

No matter how much thought Boi-1da, Swizz, Timbaland, and everyone else involved in Verzuz put into these contests, an IG Live battle can’t replace the energy and excitement of a real-life event. But the reality is, this is the next best thing. For all his love of Sound Clash culture, Boi-1da admits he’s never physically attended one himself. He just watched tapes and YouTube clips, yet that doesn’t change his love for the culture.

As difficult as all of our lives are right now, it’s not like the 1950s pre-independence Jamaica or 1970s The Bronx was rosy either. Artists back then did what artists are doing right now: making do with what they have and creating culture. We’re all confronting a dark and uncertain future. These IG Live battles aren’t just entertaining us while we’re bored, they’re planting the seeds for what music events can look like in a post-COVID-19 world.