The Roxanne Wars

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(I made some corrections to the video, so reuploaded it, wanted it to be accurate!)

Documentary of The Roxanne Wars in 1984 and 1985.

NETFLIX is releasing a Biopic Movie ROXANNE ROXANNE, which is all about a RAP BEEF in the 1980s between the Rapper ROXANNE SHANTE, and the Rap Group U.T.F.O.

This BEEF, which became known as the ROXANNE WARS spanned more than a year and prompted over 100 answer songs.



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The Roxanne Wars is the infamous RAP BATTLE between a head strong young girl named Lolita Shante' Gooden, who is better known as ROXANNE SHANTE, and the Rap group U.T.F.O. who created the now famous rap song ROXANNE ROXANNE, and then of course.. The REAL Roxanne.

The BEEF first started with the popular 80s rap group U.T.F.O. backing out of a promotion agreement with part-time music producer Marly Marl, who just happen to live across the street from what would later become one of the most infamous Female Rappers in hip-hop history.

Lolita was a young, ambitious, and talented rapper that was destined for the music industry, and after over hearing a conversation about a concert cancellation, she approached producer Marley Marl and offered to make a hip-hop record that would be aimed at getting back at U.T.F.O. for their failed concert appearance.

Lolita took on the moniker Roxanne Shante' to write an answer rap called ROXANNES REVENGE in response to the PROMOTION that Marley Marl and Disc Jockey Mr. Mike were discussing.

At this time, U.T.F.O. had a popular B-Side rap song called Roxanne Roxanne, that was doing pretty well on the radio. The Rap was about UTFO trying to seduce a girl named Roxanne, but no matter what they did or said, she turned them down.

Roxanne Shante's Rap Single Roxanne's Revenge was released in late 1984 and the music beat was an instrumental version of UTFO's Roxanne Roxanne with her own lyrics over that.

Once marley Marl realized how popular the song was, and After some legal issues, Roxanne released a new version of Roxannes Revenge in 1985 that had a new music beat and the foul language had been removed from the track.

UTFO was upset about Roxannes Revenge at first, but Seeing that this beef with Roxanne could be an opportunity, UTFO made an answer rap song called THE REAL ROXANNE.

They wrote and produced this rap song in which they take pot-shots at themselves, and then hired a rapper named Elease Jack to sing the lyrics.

UTFO intended for Elease to take on the name THE REAL ROXANNE, to try and discredit Roxanne Shante' as being the original.

The song was a HUGE hit and was played all over the US, but shortly after the songs release, UTFO and Elease had a falling out. She was not credited on the song and UTFO quickly replaced Elease with another rapper named Adelaida Martinez.

Adelaida would carry on the moniker of The Real Roxanne persona for many years to come, even though she was essentially just impersonating Roxanne Shante.

To UTFO and FULL Force, they felt they had accomplished their mission. They successfully made a hit answer record which not only helped keep their own Roxanne Roxanne Rap song relevant and still hugely popular,

But they were also able to at least partially take control of the identity of ROXANNE, and convince a lot of the public that THE REAL ROXANNE and Shante were just one person.

And even if not everyone was fooled, it certainly confused the public enough that many didn’t even care.

After the success of UTFO's Real Roxanne, things started to sorta get a bit crazy.

And While its not uncommon for an answer record to go back and forth once or twice.. The Roxanne Saga was just heating up.

With Roxanne Roxanne, Roxannes Revenge, and now The Real Roxanne all getting play time on the radio, tons of Rappers started putting out ROXANNE Diss tracks of their own.

The first diss track to follow up THE REAL ROXANNE was by rapper Sparky D.

She hailed from Brooklyn and put out an answer tape entitled Roxanne - Your Through. Which defended UTFO and was aimed at trying to discredit Roxanne Shante' as being a young and childish rapper.

But this wasn’t the last answer tape to come out..

It seemed everyone now wanted in on the Roxanne Wars. From people claiming to be Roxannes Doctor, her Brothers, little sister., and even her Parents.

In all there were a record breaking 25 recorded responses in 1985 that were officially documented in the Roxanne Wars, but historians speculate that there may have been over 100 Roxanne Answer tracks floating around by the late 80s.

By late 1985, U.T.F.O. takes another pop shot at Roxanne by releasing a new diss track called Roxanne, Roxanne Part 2: Calling Her A Crab.

After Roxanne Roxanne Part 2, Shante put out a song called Queen Of Rox.

Following up the Queen of Rox, ROXANNE Shante' finally put out an answer song called BITE THIS.