After Kendrick Lamar was widely declared the winner of last summer’s rap beef with Drake, the Grammys officially sided with the Compton, Calif., emcee when it awarded him five trophies, including song and Record of the Year, for his diss track Not Like Us.
To celebrate Not Like Us, which was aimed at the Toronto-based artist, Lamar showed up to the event in an all-denim Canadian tuxedo (a subtle dig at his rap rival).
The song was the final word in a clash that began last spring after Lamar responded to a line in Drake and J. Cole’s 2023 song First Person Shooter, in which Cole referred to the three of them as the industry’s three greatest hip-hop artists. “We the big three like we started a league,” Cole rapped.
Lamar dismissed that declaration on Future and Metro Boomin’s Like That, spitting back, “It’s just big me.” He also hit out at Drake on back-to-back diss tracks Euphoria and 6:16 in LA in which he called the lyricist “a terrible person.”
Cole waded into the fray briefly (“He still doing shows but fell off like The Simpsons,” he swiped) and then apologized admitting Lamar is “one of the greatest.”
But Drake escalated the feud by mocking Lamar for appearing on songs by Maroon 5 and Taylor Swift and made digs at the Compton freestyler’s short stature, calling him a “pipsqueak.” On another diss track, Taylor Made Freestyle, Drake used AI-generated rhymes by Tupac Shakur and Snoop Dogg to further besmirch Lamar’s name. Swift also got dragged into their back-and-forth battle when Drake declared she was the “biggest gangster in the music game right now.”
Then on his Family Matters number, Drake accused Lamar of physical abuse and infidelity.
But on his chart-topping Not Like Us, Lamar took things to another level when he branded Drake as a pedophile. “Say Drake, I hear you like ’em young / You better not ever go to cell block one / To any bitch that talk to him and they in love / Just make sure you hide your little sister from him,” he rapped.
The lines alluded to a 2010 concert video that resurfaced nearly a decade later in which the Canadian hitmaker invited a teenage fan onto the stage at a Denver show where he proceeded to dance and fondle her.
Drake denied the allegations in his rebuttal track The Heart Part 6, but Lamar’s hook-driven anthem became a viral hit that crossed a billion streams on Spotify in its first three months.
When details of the suit were revealed last month, Drake blamed the song for a shooting at his Toronto mansion and the arrests of multiple trespassers on his property. He also claimed he had to move his son out of the family home because of the track.
“The lawsuit is not about the artist who created Not Like Us,” the lawsuit said. “It is, instead, entirely about UMG, the music company that decided to publish, promote, exploit, and monetize allegations that it understood were not only false, but dangerous.”
But the company denied the allegations. “Not only are these claims untrue, but the notion that we would seek to harm the reputation of any artist — let alone Drake — is illogical,” UMG said in response.
With the lawsuit yet to play out in court, the audience inside Crypto.com Arena Sunday night sang along as if none of that drama mattered.
Taylor Swift and Beyonce were captured by cameras dancing and lip-syncing the song’s lyrics as they blared over the loudspeakers.
“At the end of the day, (there’s) nothing more powerful than rap music,” Lamar said during his first acceptance speech. “We are the culture.”
With Lamar slated to headline the Apple Music Super Bowl Halftime Show in New Orleans this coming Sunday, there are likely to be more viral moments that could emerge if he plays the song on the NFL’s biggest stage.
“He won’t do that in part because the scale and the choreography and the production of the Super Bowl halftime show has to be set in stone,” Mall said. “So, he can’t just tease and be like, ‘I know you said I can’t do this, but here I am dancing around the edges.’ … My guess is there’s no chance for him to surprise at least anyone who is in a decision-making position with what’s going to be on stage or on the field.”