It’s been a rough spring for Drake.
Earlier this month, the Toronto rapper more or less conceded victory in his bitter feud with Kendrick Lamar, quietly removed three of his diss tracks from his social media.
But Drake’s rival has gone the opposite way. Since the release of Lamar’s final diss track “Not Like Us” — on which the Compton rapper (baselessly) accuses Drake of being a “pedophile” and refers to him as a “colonizer,” among other things — the song has been everywhere, from the club to children’s birthday parties and bar mitzvahs. The track, easily a contender for the song of the summer, hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 back in May, and hasn’t left the charts since.
Drake, of course, has tried to change the subject, but it’s going to take more than a (widely misunderstood) parody song to dig out from the hole that Lamar has buried him in.
On Wednesday, to mark Juneteenth, Lamar curated a “Pop Out” concert at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles. The three-hour event, which was live-streamed on Amazon Prime, featured appearances from Tyler, The Creator, Steve Lacy, Ty Dolla Sign and YG, plus a slew of up-and-coming local rappers. Attended by 17,000 fans, including high-profile stars like The Weeknd, LeBron James and Ayo Edebiri, the concert was a showcase of Los Angeles unity — “Let the world see this,” Larar told the audience. “For all of us to be on this stage together, unity, from East side … LA, Crips, Bloods, Piru — this … is special, man..”
But it was a victory lap for Lamar, who took the opportunity to dance all over Drake’s proverbial grave.
After performing a quick set with his Black Hippy collaborators Schoolboy Q, Ab-Soul and Jay Rock, Lamar launched into his recent Drake diss tracks, including “Euphoria” and “6:16 in LA.”
Lamar was then joined onstage by legendary (and problematic) producer and rapper Dr. Dre to perform the West Coast classics “Still D.R.E. and “California Love.”
After quieting the crowd for a supposed “moment of silence,” Dre whispered “I see dead people” — the “Sixth Sense” quote that opens “Not Like Us” — sending the crowd into a frenzy.
Lamar proceed to perform the song not once, not twice, not three times, not four times, but five times.
“Y’all ain’t gonna let nobody disrespect the West Coast, huh?” Lamar said to the audience.
“Oh y’all ain’t gonna let nobody mock or imitate our legends, huh?” he added, referring to Drake’s ill-advised decision to use AI to imitate the vocals of Tupac and Snoop Dogg on his diss track “Taylor Made Freestyle.”
At one point, Lamar brought out former Toronto Raptor DeMar DeRozan and NBA star Russell Westbrook to join the revelry.
As the set closed, Lamar brought out all the performers for an epic group photo.
“(This) ain’t got nothing to do with no song at this point, ain’t got nothing to do with no back and forth records, it’s got everything to do with this moment right here,” he said. “That’s what this … was about, to bring all of us together.”
As the show ended and Lamar exited the stage, the DJ hit play on “Not Like Us” one last time, letting the crowd rap the lyrics as they filed out of the venue.
The good new, for Drake at least, is that his $500,000 stake on the Oilers winning the Stanley Cup is still alive. The Oilers take on the Panthers on Friday.
Here’s how people watching at home reacted on social media:
— With files from the Associated Press
