Angel Haze’s new song ‘Babe Ruthless’ is fiery, fierce, and fantastic
Angel Haze is no wallflower — the lightning-fast rapper’s been vocal about pushing back at the male-dominated rap world, as well as serving as an advocate for the genre’s under-served LGBTQ community (Haze is agender). But more importantly, she’s good at what she does, and her new song “Babe Ruthless” is at once a boast, a threat, and a deliciously combative, “shots definitely fired” diss track against anybody who doubts her talent, her achievements, and her ambition.
A clever twist on baseball legend Babe Ruth and also another reclamation of the word “babe,” “Babe Ruthless” is an introduction to a side personality of Haze’s, functioning like Beyoncé’s Sasha Fierce. On the track, Haze eviscerates her competition and her naysayers, slaying in both the colloquial sense (she’s on fire and so is this track), and the metaphorical sense—she employs gothic, religious, and grave imagery to evoke just how serious and seriously good she is: “Young rap Morticia / No Bible, all scripture / real sh*t, rap God / Your favorite rapper’s mortician.”
“Babe Ruthless” is in that sense a spiritual companion to Haze’s “Impossible,” the first single off of upcoming mixtape Back to the Woods. (“Babe” is the second.) Equally combative, “Impossible” is more of an underdog tune, yet both songs contribute to the feeling that Haze is here and planting her flag in the rap world for good.
In a statement to THE FADER, which premiered the track, Haze describes “Babe Ruthless” as such: “‘Babe Ruthless’ is my Machiavelli. It’s me becoming Super Saiyan. It’s me becoming something you can’t label or contain and being better at it than all the versions of myself who’ve stepped up to bat before me.” With a mission statement like that, it’s no wonder that the song (with its slightly NSFW single art; click through to listen) is as charged up as it is — which reflects well for the ever-hungry Haze.
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