We’re in a celeb battle to rival that of Hilary Duff and Lindsay Lohan back in the Golden Age of Y2K. The boys are fighting, and by boys, I’m talking about Drake and Kendrick Lamar. And J Cole, kinda. They are knee-deep in the midst of a savage and seemingly never-ending rap battle, kind of like you versus that Maid of Honor in the bridesmaids’ group chat. Some people need to lose their access to ChatGPT. Don’t worry; I’ve compiled a breakdown of Drake and Kendrick Lamar’s lyrical beef so you can look hip and in the know in front of your Gen Z coworkers.
Explaining The Drake Kendrick Lamar Beef
March 22, 2024
Kendrick, Drake, and J Cole have often been listed as the “Big Three” of rap, more specifically called this on Drake’s last album by J Cole, and apparently, Kendrick did not appreciate this grouping. In the song “Like That” by Future, Metro Boomin, and Kendrick, he dismissed the idea of being part of this “Big Three.” Instead, he rapped, “It’s just big me.” Rather than being compared to them, Kendrick felt he was the Prince to Drake’s Michael Jackson, as he said, “Prince outlived Mike Jack.” Basically that he’s a deeper, more complex artist rather than a hitmaker. That is some BDE, and I’m guessing Drake did not appreciate that.
April 5, 2024
Cole came swinging back at this with a diss track of his own. Directed at Kendrick on his surprise album, Might Delete Later, the track “7 Minute Drill” zoned in on Kendrick and his comments.
“I got a phone call, they say that somebody dissing / You want some attention, it come with extensions,” he rapped. “He still doing shows but fell off like The Simpsons.”
He further went on to critique Kendrick’s work in general but acknowledged that his debut was a “classic,” if only to rhyme by calling his latest work “tragic.”
“Your third [album] was massive and that was your prime,” he continued. “I was trailing right behind and I just now hit mine.”
April 7, 2024
And J Cole is out of the race. Two days later, he issued a public apology for the song and praised Kendrick’s music. “I ain’t gonna lie to y’all the past two days felt terrible,” he told an audience at the Dreamville Festival in North Carolina. Apparently, he had caved to pressure to respond, and the result was the “lamest, goofiest” thing he’d ever recorded. He vowed to remove it from streaming services, and said he understood if Kendrick wanted to respond. But J Cole officially removed himself from the feud at this point.
April 13, 2024
It took Drake a little time to arrange a comeback, maybe he was bingeing Baby Reindeer like he rest of us. But suddenly on April 13, a new song of his got MYSTERIOUSLY leaked. I wonder how that could have happened!
“Push Ups” featured the lyrics, “You ain’t in no Big Three, SZA got you wiped down, Travis got you wiped down, Savage got you wiped down / Like your label, boy, you in a scope right now / And you gon’ feel the aftermath of what I write down / I’m at the top of the mountain, so you tight now / Just to have this talk with yo’ ass, I had to hike down / Big difference between Mike then and Mike now.” I guess you could say he was a little bothered?
That wasn’t enough for Drake, as he also took a hit at Kendrick’s work on pop songs with “Maroon 5 need a verse, you better make it witty/Then we need a verse for the Swifties.” I get the former, but don’t hit T-Swizzle!! He even managed to reach Rick Ross with his shade, “I might take your latest girl and cuff her like I’m Ricky / Can’t believe he jumpin’ in, this n**** turnin’ 50 / Every song that made it on the chart, he got from Drizzy.”
Rick only took a few hours to respond with a diss track that accused Drake of getting plastic surgery (blink twice if it was the hairline). I guess he had already finished Baby Reindeer. The result was Drake’s mom texting him to ask if this was true, as she had wanted to get a nose job with him! He shared the screenshot to Instagram, where he laughed at Rick Ross and called him “angry and racist.”
April 19, 2024
Drake could have left it there. He could have, but he didn’t, as when do we leave things at an appropriate level? Instead, Drake put out another diss track while waiting for Kendrick’s response. In the since-deleted song, “Taylor Made Freestyle,” he used the AI-generated voices of Lamar’s idols Tupac and Snoop Dogg to further slam Kendrick. He may have lost some respect, but he did earn a cease and desist from Shakur’s estate.
After all the AI verses, Drake swooped in to accuse Kendrick of not responding to his diss track because he didn’t want to interfere with the release of Taylor Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department. Yes, and? He rapped, “Now we gotta wait a fucking week cause Taylor Swift is your new top, and if you boutta drop, she gotta approve.” Once again, Taylor is being name-dropped in rap songs and dragged into other people’s business. Girlie wishes to be excused from the narrative, so let her!!
The song has obviously since been removed, but luckily Snoop Dogg’s reaction to it is still live for our viewing pleasure.
April 21, 2024
Did someone say Kanye West? No, but he decided to get involved anyway. He sided with Kendrick, despite Kendrick’s ties to long-time nemesis Taylor Swift. Kanye released a remix of “Like That” where he took aim at Drake’s major label record deal and dismissed Drake and Cole’s lyrics, rapping: “Y’all so out of sight, out of mind/I can’t even think of a Drake line” — did he not see J Cole remove himself from this narrative??
April 30, 2024
Did you think it would end with a simple cease and desist? Of course not!! Kendrick took his time coming up with the perfect title for his diss track, and he got it. “Euphoria” coincidentally shares a title with the HBO series featuring Zendaya, Sydney Sweeney, and Hunter Schafer, which Drake produces!! Kendrick was meaner than Nate Jacobs in this one. He addressed Drake’s rumored plastic surgery, and said, “Didn’t tell ’em where you get your abs from” (Hey Alexa, can I get surgery for abs?). He clarified exactly what he thinks of Drake’s rapping, “You not a rap artist, you a scam artist with the hopes of bеing accepted.” Finally he committed the ultimate faux pas and went for Drake’s parenting skills, “I got a son to raise, but I can see you know nothin’ ’bout that.”
May 3, 2024
Okay, where do these rappers find the time to release so many songs? They must be on whatever vitamin/Ritalin concoction that fuels Taylor for the Era’s Tour. Just days later, Kendrick released “6:16 in LA,” which references Drake’s habit of using times and locations in his song titles. In the song, he tried to instigate Drake’s paranoia by claiming he has operatives inside of his label, “Have you ever thought that OVO was working for me? / Fake bully, I hate bullies / You must be a terrible person / Everyone inside your team is whispering that you deserve it.” It’s giving mean girl rumors in high school, and yes, I am very triggered.
His piece de la resistance was to have Jack Antonoff producing it, who is most known as Taylor Swift’s main man. I’m surprised she agreed to share him, or that he had anything left to offer the world after the last double album. This is likely in response to the repeated Taylor mentions, confirming he is a total Swiftie like the rest of us!!
May 3, 2024
Oh that parenting jab did not go down well, as Drake responded with “Family Matters,” a track of almost eight minutes that dived into Kendrick’s personal life. Among the allegations lyrics, Drake claimed Kendrick’s kid was actually fathered by his manager, Dave Free, and that he was abusing and being unfaithful to his fiancée Whitney Alford.
“You the Black messiah wifing up a mixed queen / And hit vanilla cream to help out with your self-esteem / On some Bobby shit, I wanna know what Whitney need” and “When you put your hands on your girl, is it self-defense ’cause she’s bigger than you?”
May 4, 2024
Seriously I need productivity tips from these rappers, because a day later Kendrick was back with “Meet the Grahams.” Obviously, the name is referencing Drake’s real name of Aubrey Graham. This song speaks directly to Drake’s son Adonis, saying that Kendrick is sorry he has Drake as a father. Can we leave the kiddos out of it?
To stir the pot further, Kendrick claimed that Drake has a secret daughter! Drake took to Instagram to refute this caim, and wrote, “Nahhhh hold on can someone find my hidden daughter pls and send her to me…these guys are in shambles 🤣🤣🤣.”
Lamar also zoned in on that rumored plastic surgery again, and rapped, “Get some discipline, don’t cut them corners like your daddy did / Fuck what Ozempic did / Don’t pay to play with them Brazilians, get a gym membership.” Yeah, get a gym membership and never go like the rest of us.
May 4, 2024
Two songs, one day!! Not even 24 hours later, Kendrick decided that he was going to circle back and mention a few more things. In “Not Like Us,” Kendrick proved that he had been taking it easy before. He made alarming accusations with lyrics like “Certified Lover Boy, certified pedophiles,” “Say, Drake, I hear you like ‘em young / You better not ever go to cell block one,” and “Tryna strike a chord and it’s probably A-minor.”
He also decided to circle back to the use of an AI-generated Tupac on “Taylor Made Freestyle” and rapped, “You think the Bay gon’ let you disrespect Pac, n****? I think that Oakland show gon’ be your last stop, n****.”
May 5, 2024
Nope, we’re not done yet, we might never be done this with epic feud. “The Heart Part 6” dropped and the title is a play on Lamar’s “The Heart” series across his albums. He claims the rumor about a daughter was started intentionally by his own team as bait for Kendrick — “You gotta learn to fact check things and be less impatient.”
The image for the song is Dave Free’s comment on an Instagram post of Whitney and the kids, to further suggest he is the father. Once again he suggested that Kendrick is a “woman beater” and told Whitney to hit him up if she needs help.
Also, in terms of the pedophilia accusation, Drake specified, “Only fuckin’ with Whitneys, not Millie Bobby Browns, I’d never look twice at no teenager.” Now the girl from Stranger Things is involved?! She has spoken out in the past about her friendship with Drake, but still, leave her out of the narrative. The good news is that he mentioned that Kendrick is a “Pulitzer prize winner!”
