“Dear Adonis, I’m sorry that man is your father,” American artist Kendrick Lamar raps on his song Meet the Grahams. ‘That man’ is Canadian artist Drake. Adonis is Drake’s son and the song is a so-called diss track. The feud between Kendrick Lamar and Drake is world news, and has been covered by American media Rolling Stone and Billboard mockingly renamed ‘Hip-hop’s Civil War’ – a verbal civil war of hip-hop. A host of major rappers and producers are involved: from rappers J. Cole, Future and A$AP Rocky to producers Metro Boomin, The Alchemist and Mustard. What is going on here?
While Lamar and Drake enjoyed working together at the beginning of their careers, such as on the famous song ‘Poetic Justice’ (2012), things have been going on between the two for years. Although it was a pinprick here and there for a long time, the boiling point has suddenly been reached very quickly in a few weeks. The ‘beef’ is becoming increasingly personal – from death threats back and forth to unsubstantiated accusations about family members, pedophilia and hidden children.
The big three
Kendrick Lamar, Drake and J. Cole are seen by the hip-hop world as the best three artists of the moment (‘The Big Three’). On the song ‘First Person Shooter’, a track by Drake and J. Cole from October 2023, J. Cole raps that he and Drake are the best. Lamar didn’t think so, so he raps on ‘Like That’, a song with Future and producer Metro Boomin, “Motherfuck the Big 3, n*gga, it’s just Big Me!” J. Cole responded to this with the track ‘7 Minute Drill’, where he states that Lamar’s oeuvre does not amount to much. Lamar won, among other things, a Pullitzer Prize for his album DAMN. (2017).
But after Cole publicly announced a few days later that he regretted his diss, he even removed the song from his album. He was met with ridicule, both from public opinion and from Lamar and, surprisingly, from Drake. Because you don’t apologize for a diss. In the world of hip hop you stand behind your lyrics. It is now considered a wise choice on social media that Cole left early, because the diss tracks between Lamar and Drake are starting to take on grotesque proportions.
The diss track
The diss track phenomenon is as old as hip hop itself. You use poetry and music to fight out arguments: it sounds good and it is also a way for world stars to prove that they have their ‘street credibility‘ have still retained. Unfortunately, it doesn’t always stop at poetry. Take Tupac and The Notorious BIG (Biggie Smalls). In the 1990s they single-handedly brought the rivalry between hip hop from the West Coast (Los Angeles) and East Coast (New York) to life. In 1993 they were still friends, in 1994 Tupac was shot in New York, an attack that he survived. He accused Biggie and his associates of it, after which Biggie responded with the diss track ‘Who shot ya?’ came. Tupac contrasted this with the track ‘Hit ’em up’. These are two iconic songs, but the menacing lyrics leave little to the imagination. In 1996, Tupac was shot dead, six months later Biggie found his grave in the same way. Evidence that one is guilty of the other’s murder has never been found.
The Lamar and Drake feud is the biggest feud in hip-hop since Tupac and Biggie, mainly due to the new role of social media and streaming numbers
Streaming figures
The feud between Lamar and Drake is the biggest feud in hip-hop since Tupac and Biggie, mainly due to the new role of social media and streaming numbers. Lamar’s diss track ‘Euphoria’ was the most streamed hip-hop track on its debut day with nine million streams in one day (the song has now been streamed 35 million times on Spotify). ‘Like That’, Lamar’s first diss against Drake and J. Cole, now has 221 million streams. Drake’s response ‘Push Ups’ debuted at number twenty on the ‘Billboard Hot 100’ chart, the top chart in the United States, and has been streamed 55 million times at the time of writing.
The audience no longer has to wait for radio or TV to listen to the diss, but can make a judgment a minute after the track leaves the studio. The question of how quickly one responds fuels productivity: at the time of writing, Lamar and Drake have jointly released no fewer than ten diss tracks, eight of which in the past two weeks.
Vicious texts
That’s too much to parse here, but Lamar in particular thunders over Drake with one track after another. Lamar accuses Drake of serious crimes with vicious lyrics: Drake is said to be a bad father, to hide a daughter (just like he once did with his son Adonis), and to be a pedophile. He would also be too light in skin color to be allowed to use the n-word, but Drake does so frequently.
Drake, in turn, states, among other things, that Lamar’s fiancée is cheating and has been impregnated by one of Lamar’s best friends. He also allegedly gave Lamar false information about having a hidden daughter so that Lamar would reveal it. He responds to the allegations of pedophilia on his latest track ‘The heart part 6’: “If I was fucking young girls, I would have been arrested. I’m way too famous for this shit you just suggested.”
No one knows what is true of all the accusations and where this argument will go. But it is clear that the conflict is good for business and music.
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