Timbaland and Swizz Beatz have changed the culture with their innovative “Verzuz” battles on Instagram Live. Fans have been kept entertained with battles such as Mannie Fresh versus Scott Storch, Ne-Yo versus Johntá Austin, RZA versus DJ Premier, Lil Jon versus T-Pain and Sean Garrett versus The Dream.

Timbaland is now opening up to TMZ Live about how “Verzuz” came to life.

“You know, God works in mysterious ways,” he said. “Like you said, me and Swizz planned this three and a half years ago and I guess by you know everybody sitting at home — what is the common thing that brings people together? Music.”

“So I called Swizz,” he continued. “I was like, ‘We should do our battle now.’ And he was like, ‘Perfect.’ And we just — we didn’t promote it, we just did it.”

Major companies have already started to reach out to the duo showing interest in “Verzuz.” Timbaland shut down any speculation that “Verzuz” will start charging fans to watch the battles.

“I mean, you know a lot of people contacted me and Swizz you know on a lot of things, but right now we just wanna keep it for the culture because it’s so organic,” he stated. “We don’t wanna bring that part of the element in right away. We just wanna keep it where people are entertained because we living in a world where 16 million people lost jobs. We don’t wanna get into the politics of it. We wanna keep it natural and fun.”

The next battle of “Verzuz” will take place April 18 between Babyface and Teddy Riley. The battle was originally scheduled to take place April 5, but Babyface and his family contracted Coronavirus. The two R&B legends will go head-to-head with 20 songs each.

Check out Timbaland’s interview with TMZ below.