Drake and Kendrick Lamar‘s ongoing beef took a new turn over the weekend as rumors began flying that round two could be imminent. However, there seems to be a whole lot of talking going on and no real confirmations that anything is popping off.
New Developments in Kendrick Lamar and Drake’s Feud
After things died down in May once Kendrick and Drake dropped their final songs in the rap battle, last week and this past weekend has been filled with some interesting developments in their ongoing saga.
K-Dot and Drizzy weren’t the ones to speak on their venomous feud. Instead it was Mustard. Things kicked off last Wednesday (Aug. 21) when Mustard referred to Drake as a “strange guy” in a new interview with The Los Angeles Times. “I don’t think I want to make a song with that dude,” Mustard said. “He’s a strange guy.”
Then last Friday (Aug. 23), Drake returned to his @plottttwistttttt finsta account to drop off another three new songs. The tracks followed the massive 100 gigs drop of new music and behind-the-scenes footage Drake delivered in early August. This time around, Drizzy dropped “Sod,” “Circadian Rhythm (The Language 2)” and “No Face” featuring Playboi Carti.
On the latter song, the lyrics seemingly reference Drake’s growing laundry list of enemies in the game.
“Ni**as got lit off the features I skated on/I gotta know, I gotta know how you get lit off the ni**a you hatin on?/Numbers untouchable, they got the data wrong,” Drake raps. “This is the moment I know they been praying on/Trying out The Boy, but f**k it, I’m staying on.”
Drizzy then went on to rap other bars in reference to his beef on the Playboi Carti-assisted track. “My therapist put in a 30-day notice ’cause I keep on talkin’ ’bout beefin’ and business and money and women,” The Boy spits. “It’s no diagnosis, they emptied the clip quick/Swap that sh*t out and I came back reloaded/I’m just so happy that ni**as who envied and held that sh*t in got to finally show it/I’m over the moon, yeah, we’ll see you boys soon.”
In what seemed like a bit of a response to Mustard’s “strange guy” comment, Drake dropped an old video of a time he worked with the producer. Drake continued to add to his sprawling 100 gigs video dump with some previously unreleased footage of himself having conversations with Mustard and YG while making 2014’s “Who Do You Love?,” in addition to Ye footage.
As the lyrics, songs and videos began to make the rounds on the internet, Drake added fuel to the fire on his burner Instagram account on Sunday (Aug. 25). The Toronto MC shared a picture from the 1987 film A Better Tomorrow with the number “2” at the bottom of the screen. He also posted an interview clip of former Detroit Pistons star Rasheed Wallace. The 2004 video features Wallace speaking about how his team would crush the Indiana Pacers in game two of the Eastern Conference Finals.
“Y’all can put it on the front page, back page, middle page, wherever, headliners, column one or two, we will win game two,” Wallace said to the camera.
Drake was possibly implying a round two in his beef with Kendrick.
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Rumors of a New Kendrick Lamar Album Start Again
Discussions then started to heat up on X, formerly known as Twitter, after someone shared an alleged screenshot of a text conversation with K-Dot. In the alleged convo, the Compton rapper seemed to be talking about putting out a new album.
“But aye. Is the album coming or is you just on demon,” someone texted Kendrick.
“We coming,” he allegedly replied.
However, as quickly as the rumor began, DJ Hed, a friend of Kendrick’s and the DJ who opened the MC’s Pop Out event back in June, called cap on the whole ordeal. Throughout the last few months, there has been speculation across social media that K-Dot may drop a new album, but no confirmation from Kendrick himself. XXL also reached out to Kendrick Lamar’s team to confirm whether or not a project is set to drop.
Then DJ Akademiks pushed back on Hed’s claims that Ak doesn’t speak to Kendrick. This seemed like a jab at Ak reporting on updates regarding Kendrick’s music to Ak’s streaming community. Hed immediately clapped back and said no one from Kendrick’s team would ever talk to Ak, which caused the latter to go off on his livestream.
“I’m the greatest single journalist you’ve ever heard of,” Ak said. “You could be f**kin’ Kendrick. If I said it, that’s what it is… DJ Hed, you go ask Kendrick… you up under that n***as crotch.”
Looks like there won’t be a Kendrick Lamar album right now, but that doesn’t mean it’s not on the way. And while there’s no proof Drake is kickstarting a new phase in this ongoing war, he’s definitely sending out coded messages via the ’Gram. The energy feels like this feud is far from over.
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