Teddy Riley & Babyface Faced Off On Verzuz & The Culture Won

We’ve watched a number of our favorite artists go toe-to-toe in friendly Instagram Live Battles. The events were first created to pass the time during quarantine, and now Timbaland and Swizz Beatz have turned them into a full-on business. The award-winning artists have become some sort of online music promoters as they broker many of these battles, and one that fans have been looking forward to for weeks was between music legends Teddy Riley and Babyface.

Both men are icons in their own right, and from the inception, Babyface been made clear that their “battle” was really just a celebration of Black music. The men attempted to connect over the weekend, but a series of unfortunate events—Teddy’s technical issues—caused a cancelation just three songs into the battle. They were finally able to come together once again on Monday (April 20), giving everyone the 4-20 they deserve.

Over 500K people were tuned at one time and after the battle was over, Swizz revealed that over 3 million people watched in total. If you were one of the lucky fans (like myself) who was able to groove to some classic hits, you would’ve also seen a few familiar faces in the comments including Scott Storch, Diddy, Pusha T, Common, Busta Rhymes, 2 Chainz, Common, Tamar Braxton, Mariah Carey, Raekwon, Eniko Hart, Fat Joe, Boosie Badazz, Snoop Dogg, Brandy, Ludacris, Kandi Burruss, Ashanti, Gabrielle Union, Brian-Michael Cox, Keyshia Cole, Charlamagne Tha God, Anthony Anderson, Chris Tucker…and many, many more.

Toni Braxton became the talk of social media following the first Instagram Live attempt between Teddy and Babyface for her seemingly funny, yet shady, tweets. She emerged as a viewer for Monday’s Live, revealing that there was a song that went to another artist that she wished was her own. “I was so jealous,” she commented as Babyface played Tevin Campbell’s “I’m Ready.” She added, “When I heard that I wanted that song so bad!” Check out a few highlights and memes about the battle between Teddy Riley and Babyface below. Let us know your favorite songs from either one of these greats in the comments.