yachty and drake

Lil Yachty Reveals How He Formed His Tight Bond With Drake

By Tony M. Centeno

February 23, 2023

Lil Yachty's friendship with Drake has benefitted both artists in more ways than one. After contributing beats to Her Loss last year, Yachty is sharing exactly how he got so close with the 6 God. During his debut appearance on the Rap Radar Podcast , which dropped on Thursday, February 23, hosts Elliott Wilson and Brian "B. Dot" Miller kick off the conversation by discussing the reception to Yachty's latest album Let's Start Here . Yachty said he appreciated the praise but feels there's more to be done. He also explained why he felt like he wasn't respected as an artist or a rapper.

“I did things when was trying to prove myself as a rapper, and I’m past that… now I’m trying to prove myself as an artist.” @lilyachty clarifies his comments of being taken “seriously as an artist” in a new @RapRadar interview. #OGM pic.twitter.com/ELdxpv6g4g — Our Generation Music (@OGMusicCo) February 23, 2023

"I do more than rap," Yachty said. "For a long time in my career, I wanted to be taken seriously as a rapper and I said that. So I would go try and do radio interviews or freestyles or whatever because I did Michigan Boy Boat and I did things to prove that I was a rapper, and I'm passed that. Now I'm proving that I'm an artist... I never wrote off being a rapper as not like being taken serious or not being as big as other genres/musicians or any of that. I just specifically myself, not speaking or nobody else or genre, want to be taken seriously as an artist." Later on the conversation, Yachty also mentioned that he tried to get other artists like The Weeknd and Kid Cudi to contribute to the album, but ultimately settled for his friends like Justine Skye and Daniel Caesar . After B. Dot brought up his best friend Drake, Wilson asked Yachty about how he got involved with Drizzy and 21 Savage's Her Loss LP. Yachty produced songs like “Major Distribution,” “Privileged Rappers,” “Circo Loco" and “Jumbrotron S**t Poppin." “I, for a very long time, wanted to do anything involving music with [Drake],” Yachty said. “So I’ve been telling him for the last, like, I don’t know how many years, like, ‘Bro...can I even just be in the room? I just wanna soak it up and see how you do it. I wanna see you rap, I wanna anything, you know?’ For real. I just feel like he’s -- to my opinion -- the greatest rapper ever. And that’s my personal opinion. I ain’t arguing with nobody or their mama.” Watch the newest episode of the Rap Radar Podcast via Interval Presents below.

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The Rebirth of Boat

Between his high-profile bro-ship with Drake and a decidedly non-rap album in ‘Let’s Start Here.,’ Lil Yachty may have been the most talked-about hip-hop artist of 2023. The question is: What comes next?

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It’s easy now to forget how we thought of Tyler, the Creator before 2017, but it’s worth recounting. As the leader of the Odd Future clique, he was considered something of a juvenile prankster, more known for his (admittedly offensive) provocations than his (admittedly many) talents. Taken at face value, he was a jester in a Supreme cap, Bart Simpson trading his slingshot for a cracked copy of Fruity Loops.

That changed, however, with the release of Tyler’s fourth album, Flower Boy . It was a revelation: candid, confessional, mature—all without losing its sense of adventurousness. Flower Boy was daring and at times gorgeous. Maybe that version of Tyler was lurking inside all along, but it came as somewhat of a shock to the larger listening public. (Including us here at The Ringer , who called the album “radiant” and said it seemed to be made with “more purpose” than anything he had tried previously.)

Tyler’s journey to Flower Boy feels relevant when discussing the most important figure in rap music of this year: Lil Yachty. Once dismissed as a “mumble rapper” or a red-braided featherweight, the rapper born Miles McCollum has undergone something of a transformation the past 12 months. The one-time King of Teens is grown now, and at 26 years old, he finds himself at a crossroads similar to the one where Tyler was at that age.

Yachty’s metamorphosis has included several facets, from becoming something of a spiritual North Star for Drake to going viral with the most addictive song of his career, “Poland.” But when we talk about the renewed sense of artistry Yachty found in 2023, it begins with one thing: Let’s Start Here. , his LP from January, which does away with the “bubblegum trap” of earlier in his career and embraces vibey guitar music. It’s possibly the best album of his career—and almost certainly the biggest pivot any mainstream artist has made in the past few years. But more importantly, it’s a statement of intent that was, like Flower Boy , made with more purpose than anything he had previously attempted. “Fuck any of the albums I dropped before this one. … I wanted to show people a different side of me—and that I can do anything,” the two-time Grammy-nominated artist told Billboard last spring.

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Let’s Start Here. is the multiplatinum-selling artist’s fifth studio album and first official full-length in three years . From the outside looking in, it seemed like Yachty was at peace with doing more of the same musically (save for “Poland”; more on that in a minute) and that his influence had plateaued. He had obviously branched out and stacked up wins in other areas—his 2021 mixtape Michigan Boy Boat is a cult favorite—but when it came to his own music, the progression felt stagnant.

LSH , which is heavily inspired by Pink Floyd–esque psychedelic rock, replaces Yachty’s sticky refrains, trap production, and tongue-in-cheek rhymes with reverberating vocals, drawn-out live instrumentation, and very little wordplay. It’s also important to mention that he had a hand in producing 12 of the 14 tracks . Many of Yachty’s past projects have been predominantly feature-heavy, enlisting high-profile names ranging from Future to Vince Staples, but LSH is noticeably stripped back. The album has a seven -minute intro whose back half is completely devoid of lyrics. This is planets away from the repetitive earworms of his early career like “Minnesota” and “Peek A Boo.” That said, he doesn’t totally leave his trademark intoxicating melodies behind on LSH . “sAy sOMETHINg” and “paint THE sky,” a pair of back-to-back highlights, show what’s possible when he finds the right balance between his distinctly stretchy, auto-tuned riffs and the multilayered, slowed instrumentals.

Conversely, “drive ME crazy!” exemplifies one of the many moments when Yachty takes the back seat and lets his supporting cast take center stage. The love song opens with a groovy bass line and Diana Gordon’s voice gliding over a bed of high-pitched strings. Yachty matches her energy with his own crooning before his verse is hijacked by a kaleidoscope of synths that drown him out. He returns on the back end, closing out the song with a rare bit of rapping over a laid-back, snare drum–laced beat. It’s some of his most thoughtful work to date.

LSH is by no means a perfect album, and Yachty’s shortcomings are exposed on tracks where it sounds like he’s wearing his influences a little too much on his sleeve. Upon multiple spins, both “running out of time” and “THE zone~” feel closer to Tame Impala cosplay than anything groundbreaking.

Yachty’s always been known for being versatile and chameleonic, but not to the degree of making full-on, drug-inspired rock music, so to describe this as a creative risk is quite apt. However, the calculated gambit ended up marking a series of career bests for Yachty. LSH debuted at no. 1 on three separate Billboard charts , became his highest-rated album on Metacritic , and earned endorsements from sources as varied as Questlove and Anthony Fantano . But while a lot has been written about LSH and Yachty’s intentional move away from raps, the heat check that came next is equally as interesting.

Starting in April with “ Strike (Holster) ,” Yachty converted tracks from an already recorded rap album into a handful of singles he released over the next five months. The songs in question—“ Slide ,” “ Solo Steppin Crete Boy ,” “ Tesla ,” and “ The Secret Recipe. ”—range from a freestyle with online superstar Kai Cenat to going bar for bar with one of hip-hop’s finest, J. Cole. These weren’t just a few loosies he was trying to pump out before his next album, either; each song had a corresponding music video to match and felt aesthetically different from the last.

More importantly, the songs felt fresh, and his writing felt much more polished than in many of his earlier rap efforts (the less we talk about “COUNT ME IN,” the better). The decision to return to his roots in between non-rap projects is smart for a few reasons. It holds over his day-one fans by playing the hits, it sustains the buzz he generated from LSH without oversaturating the market, and it gives him a chance to move the needle on the long-standing narrative that he isn’t a “serious” rapper (a notion that’s plagued his career). There will always be those who question Yachty’s lyrical ability, but if nothing else, these drops showcase a noticeably refined pen game without losing his special knack for generating legitimate bangers .

This is a sharp shift from a few years back, when Yachty was (wrongly) seen as more of a mushed-mouth interloper than a capital-A Artist. His rapid rise was met with harsh backlash almost immediately due to some combination of Yachty’s perceived allergy to lyricism in his music and an indifference to rap’s history and the legends who came before him. After Yachty revealed that he didn’t take the storied art form seriously during a Hot 97 interview , the floodgates opened and many of the genre’s veteran gatekeepers (the old heads ) stepped up to take their shots. Funkmaster Flex took to the airwaves to disparage Yachty’s lack of bars, Ebro Darden, who conducted said interview, went back and forth with him online, and Joe Budden said point-blank that he isn’t hip-hop.

Fast-forward to November of this year and Yachty is still ruffling the feathers of rap traditionalists , but this time—in an ironic turn of events—from the other side of the aisle. “The place that hip-hop is in right now is a terrible place … it’s a lot of imitation. It’s a lot of quick, low-quality music being put out. It’s trendy. It’s a lot less risk-taking. It’s a lot less originality,” he said at a Rolling Stone event .

How did Yachty—the same artist who was once maligned for “ruining the culture”—reach a point where he feels empowered enough to act as a spokesperson and critique the very same genre that tried to reject him?

Well, having influence over the biggest artist rap has ever seen certainly bolsters his credibility on the subject.

“This lil Drizzy reppin’ Crete.”

Those are the opening words on “Another Late Night,” a memorable cut from one of the most popular albums of the year, Drake’s For All the Dogs . On the surface, the lyric is a simple hat tip from the Canadian megastar to Lil Yachty (and his blossoming label Concrete Boyz ), who spits the song’s infamous second verse and is credited as a coproducer. But after you dig deeper and reflect on the past 12 months for Yachty, that line—and, by extension, the song—serves as a fitting microcosm of his 2023 run, which is inextricably linked to a fruitful friendship turned partnership with Drake.

lil drizzy reppin crete pic.twitter.com/WstTwnDjbb — CONCRETE BOY BOAT^ (@lilyachty) October 25, 2023

Rewind the clock back to the end of 2022, and two important developments occur: the accidental virality of hit single “Poland” and the start of that Drake alliance. Last October, a snippet of a new Lil Yachty song leaked online and rapidly took over TikTok , so much so that he was all but forced to drop it. Yachty even admitted that he recorded it as a joke and never planned to have it come out. Just days later, “Poland” became his only solo release of that year. The song’s catchy hook and extraterrestrial beat set the internet ablaze almost immediately upon its streaming arrival. “Poland” is now up to more than 130 million streams on Spotify ( The Ringer ’s parent company) and over 30 million views on its accompanying Lyrical Lemonade music video . Not bad for an accident.

Not even a month removed from the “Poland” takeover, Yachty showed up all over Drake and 21 Savage’s surprise collab album, Her Loss . He appeared not as a featured act but instead as an executive producer of sorts, receiving coproduction credits on a fourth of the tracklist. He also supplied a handful of ad-libs on “BackOutsideBoyz” and “Jumbotron Shit Poppin” and even claimed to have chosen the project’s cover art as well. (At least he didn’t go with an AI image, like he did for nightmare fuel on Let’s Start Here .)

Yachty’s involvement on the album felt like a test run from Drake to see if their budding bromance could evolve into a prosperous musical union as well as prove that their past chemistry on “Oprah’s Bank Account” wasn’t a fluke. And boy, did Yachty pass with flying colors. Their collaboration on Her Loss launched a close working relationship between the two, as evidenced by his influence pouring over onto For All the Dogs .

The Concrete Boyz CEO and October’s Very Own boss linked back up for seconds on Drake’s eighth studio album. Yachty’s fingerprints are all over the project, with five coproduction credits as well as his verse on “Another Late Night,” which is the first time he’s been listed as an official feature on one of Drizzy’s songs. And this doesn’t even include two more coproduction nods on Drake’s Scary Hours 3 , a six-pack EP doubling as a FATD deluxe edition. Dating back to last November, that brings the total number of Yachty-produced Drake songs up to 12. Simply put, Her Loss and FATD don’t exist without Lil Yachty. The frequent collaborators have formed an inseparable bond over the past year-plus, which has simultaneously impacted the 6 God’s output and elevated Yachty’s commercial ceiling.

Yachty is no stranger to stardom, having featured on a couple of top-five Billboard Hot 100 hits (“Broccoli” and “iSpy”), being named to the now-iconic 2016 XXL Freshman Class , modeling for Yeezy Season 3 , and racking up millions of streams, all before he was legally old enough to drink. Additionally, he had cemented his status among rap fans and critics alike as a SoundCloud favorite born out of the so-called “mumble rap” era. His influence can be seen in the likes of Juice WRLD , Trippie Redd , Lil Tecca , and Yeat —all artists who shaped the past half decade of rap music in their own right.

Still, there’s nothing quite like the Drake stimulus package. According to Hip Hop by the Numbers , Yachty’s appearance on FATD subsequently boosted his monthly listeners on Spotify by a whopping 40 percent .

Over the years, Drake’s become notorious for attaching himself to the coattails of various artists—adopting the Weeknd’s moody aesthetics, Playboi Carti’s flow, Bad Bunny’s language, Skepta’s U.K. slang, the list goes on—as they just so happen to be peaking in their respective lanes. He’s pretty much got it down to a science at this point: He’ll seek out the hottest sound, find an artist who’s spearheading it, and pair up with them so it doesn’t come off like he’s fully biting their style. In Yachty’s case, it doesn’t hurt that he and Drake seem to be genuine BFFs outside the booth, but it’s also an endorsement of his musical worldview. Drake said it best on “ Wick Man ”: “Boat say he the recipe, I must be the key ingredient.”

Now it’s up to Yachty to use that recipe for himself. His past year hasn’t been without its blemishes— awkwardly minimizing rapper Sexxy Red’s trauma on his podcast, singling out a Pitchfork critic for simply doing his job, calling internet trolls “gay,” and getting sued by the SEC among them—but Yachty is operating on a different plane now. He’s got more visibility, and it’s reasonable to expect that he’ll be more in demand as a producer. (His work with City Girls on “Act Up” shows that he’s more than just a Drake-hit wonder.) The Aubrey cosign has a mixed track record on helping the artist he’s borrowing from—ask Earl Sweatshirt his opinions on that—but given Yachty’s history and stature, he’s more likely to end up a Lil Baby than a BlocBoy JB. And he seems intent on making sure of it—as he told Variety , he’s already planning another non-rap LP for the new year, which could explore sounds beyond what he experimented with on Let’s Start Here .

It’s similar to the situation Tyler, the Creator found himself in coming out of 2017. Tyler could’ve easily rested on his laurels after Flower Boy , but instead he doubled down. (His fifth full-length, IGOR , was an even bolder artistic risk than Flower Boy and won him a Grammy; it’s a perfect album.) He’d later return to a more conventional approach with his 2021 Gangsta Grillz homage, Call Me If You Get Lost , but he did so from a position of power: having changed the trajectory of his career and earned the respect of even his most vehement doubters. Yachty took note: “He’s [Tyler, the Creator] the reason I made this album. He’s the one who told me to do it, just go for it. He’s so confident and I have so much respect for him because he takes me seriously, and he always has,” he said in March .

If the past 12 months have done anything for Yachty, they’ve made it clear we should take him as seriously as Tyler takes him—and he takes himself. But if he’s learned anything from Tyler, 2023 simply could be a launchpad into yet another transformation. Yachty titled his big pivot Let’s Start Here. because to him, it’s just the beginning of something. What happens next is arguably more interesting, even if the ending remains a question mark.

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Drake Talks Plans for a "Graceful Exit" From the Music Industry

“i’m not going to force myself to compete.”.

After releasing his critically acclaimed Let’s Start Here album , Lil Yachty has now turned his attention to his sunglasses brand, FUTUREMOOD . Promoting his emerging imprint, Lil Yachty launched FUTUREMOOD ‘s “A Moody Conversation” by tapping Drake for a candid interview.

During the chat, the two artists went back and forth in the engaging conversation but an interesting moment came when Drake shared that he’s been mulling “a graceful exit.” At the 5:50 mark, the Canadian artist begins to discuss the idea after being asked about what there is “to even search for or want” anymore. “Well, I think like on a broader scale, I think I’m at the point now where I just wanna, like—I feel like maybe we talked about this the other day—but I feel like I’m kind of introducing the concept in my mind of a graceful exit, said Drake.”

  View this post on Instagram   A post shared by C.V T (@lilyachty)

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Drake and Lil Yachty Dance With Wolves in an Enchanted Forest in ‘Another Late Night’ Video

The song's lyrics also appear to address criticism of the 36-year-old rapper's friendship with 19-year-old "Stranger Things" star Millie Bobby Brown.

By Gil Kaufman

Gil Kaufman

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Drake goes on a trippy late night ghostride in the new video for his For All the Dogs song “Another Late Night.” The Cole Bennett-directed clip that dropped to coincide with the rapper’s latest studio album features Lil Yachty living it up in a forest illuminated by Christmas lights and, for some reason, frequented by a pack of wolves and a luminous owl.

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Drake, 36, also appears to hit back at “weirdo” haters who criticized his close friendship with Stranger Things star Millie Bobby Brown, who he said in 2018 that he texted with frequently when the British actress was just 14 years old; at the time Brown said Drake was a “great role model.”

On “Another Late Night,” Drizzy raps, “My bank account is magnolia, Milly rockin’, ay/ Weirdos in my comments talkin’ about some Millie Bobby, look/ Bring them jokes up to the gang, we get to really flockin’,” in what then appears to be another set of shots at Rocky.

Check out Drake’s “Another Late Night” video below.

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Drake, lil yachty rap under the lights in “another late night” video.

The joint track hails from Drake's 'For All The Dogs.'

By Amber Corrine

Amber Corrine

Staff Writer, News

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Drake  has released the video for “ Another Late Night ,” featuring Lil Yachty from his new album   For All The Dogs .

The Cole Bennett-directed video premiered through Lyrical Lemonade on Friday (Oct. 6), where Drizzy and Lil Boat rap under an array of lights, surrounded by wolves.

Drake raps, “My bank account is magnolia, Milly rockin’, ayy/ Weirdos in my comments talkin’ ’bout some Millie Bobby, look/ Bring them jokes up to the gang, we get to really flockin’/ Or send a finger to your mama in some FedEx boxes/ Open up that sh*t, it’s jaw droppin’, really shockin’, ayy/ I ain’t pretty flacko, bi**h, this sh*t get really rocky, ayy, what?”

He also plays on A$AP Rocky’s name .

Yachty then comes in with, “It’s Lil Boat, I’m practically now from the 6ix/ My doggy Luxxy ignorant, he from the bricks/ Thinkin’ ’bout this styro cup, really Wockin’/ Let her f**k on one my opps, let’s see who really poppin’.”

Both rappers sport interesting looks as Yachty wears a mouth full of gold, and Drake dons colorful flower barrettes in his hair. See the video above.

Drake recently showed love to the “Poland” rapper during his Field Trip Tour.

Taking the mic, the “Slime You Out” rapper told Yachty’s fans, “First of all, I just wanna say, y’all make some noise for one of my best friends in the muthaf**kin’ world. You been going crazy tonight. I haven’t been home in four months, so you take yourself a little break. I’ma try some sh*t out.” Drake then proceeded to perform “Meltdown,” a collaborative song from Travis Scott‘s  UTOPIA .

“Me and him are kind of different when it comes to lifestyle,” Yachty recently told  Complex . “We’re really similar as people, but as far as life, we’re very different. I don’t go out, he loves to go out, he loves to host people, he loves to party and I don’t like people that much.”

“I record every day all day, where he kind of is very selective on his recording days as he has more of a life than I do,” he added. “And, he is much more into actually living life as to where I am literally trying to record music every day.”

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After Drake and Lil Yachty, Rap Show ‘On The Radar’ Plans to Keep the Hits Coming

By Mankaprr Conteh

Mankaprr Conteh

This summer, hip-hop channel On The Radar was on everyone’s radar as it rose to become one of the internet’s finest purveyors of freestyle videos and interviews, reaching a new high with a Drake appearance featuring buzzing U.K. rap star Central Cee . Both traded bars at the show’s New York studio, shrouded in its signature green-means-go lights. Beyond producing the best music meme of the season (Drake slurring “combination” in one of his infamous accents during the song’s intro) it also produced one of the hottest rap songs of the summer. The internet moves quickly, though — in another life, the song would still be ringing off everywhere, but even On The Radar has kept it moving. Lil Yachty teased his own freestyle days ago and it arrived on October 6, meaning OTR snagged yet another hitmaker having a career-redefining moment, with Yachty still shapeshifting after a decade as one of rap’s most enthralling weirdos.

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I’d love to know more about the origins and goals of the label. Gabe: I always wanted to put out music and we saw, I always credit Charlie Sloth and Fire in the Booth as being a big inspiration. And I noticed how they have put out their freestyles on DSPs and I’m like, oh, we could probably figure out a way to do this, too.

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So the goal is not necessarily to sign artists to contracts for projects, but t o do singles, EPs, stuff like that? Gabe: We do want to eventually sign artists down the line and then Tobby will one day move into more of a management position for artists. But right now we don’t have the necessary funds that we need to make that happen where it makes sense to sign artists. So until then, it’s just like, let’s just put out dope music and just let that ride and see what happens. The most music we ever dropped on a Friday was 14 singles.

John Nurse: The thing is we distribute through ourselves. So a lot of people been on our line stuff as far as distribution, like [proposing a joint venture with a major label] so we’re trying to look for the right situation, but right now we’re going to do it all ourselves.

Gabe P: And then everybody on my team gets a piece of the pie. Everybody gets a piece from Tobby to John, even Calvin who takes photos to Rob the engineer, which is unheard of in the industry. Everybody on my team gets to eat off of whatever we make for the rest of our lives off the music.

What would doing everything you’ve set out to do look like? Gabe P: There’s no angle. It’s just like what’s next? Because if I set an angle for myself, then I’m limiting myself. You know what I’m saying? Drake was just a stepping stone. You could ask [Tobbylola and John], a week after the Drake thing went up, they’re like, “so are you feeling it?” And I’m like, “cool.” Oh, it’s number one on RapCaviar . I’m like, okay, that’s cool. We got shit to do.

Tobbylola, tell me about your path. Tobbylola: I was working in media since I graduated from high school. I was writing for my school’s newspaper. Then when I went onto college, I had the opportunity to start interning at Hot 97. Then at a point I started writing for The Source and then for Lyrical Lemonade. One day I started doing press runs to assist artists. I was working with Boston Richie at the time, and I wanted to bring him to Gabe’s platform. So I had hit up my friend Shauna James from Atlantic Records, and I was like, “Hey, can you connect me with him?” And she did. And I brought Richie over to him and I was like, “I see your set-up here. It is cool. I feel like I could bring some structure.” I felt like I got artists from writing for Lyrical, so I could probably bring them over there. And I was like, “let’s just cook up.” One day Gabe just called me and was like, “Hey, I got my studio now. So you said you want to help me with scheduling, let’s just try for a week.” And then we just tried for a week and then to now they’re obsessed. They haven’t let me go since. But really we just created a family. I just saw there was stuff that was missing there. And then I tried to just be that person to just come on board and really just connect the dots where it made sense

John: A few people have asked me, “You don’t want to go back to the majors?” I’m like, yeah, no, because over there you have to do so much just to get recognized and just to move up, as opposed to now I’m at the head of an independent level and doing bigger things than I would’ve had responsibility for over there.

They’re very steeped in their tradition. It’s like, media publications are like that too, right? John: Especially radio. I used to work in promotions. A lot of people that were there when I was there in 2013, ’14, they’re all still there now. And respectfully, it’s great to hold a job. I ain’t trying to take nobody out. But also there’s got to be some type of balance where you got a lot of young people and the old people to coincide.

Tobbylola: I think that’s what makes On The Radar so different is because really this is a team that was like, we’re all just coming together now, just trying to make things make sense. It’s really not no old head who’s on top of us [saying] “Do this, do this.” The old head really is Gabe.

Gabe P: The old head really is John.

Tobbylola: No, you know I didn’t want to say that. But if you saying whose brand, who calls the shots, obviously it’s Gabe’s brand.

Gabe P: And there’s no one who’s been this young who’s had this much impact on the culture in such a short period of time. You know what I’m saying? I’m not knocking anybody, but I’m saying that there hasn’t been someone who maybe since Angie Martinez or early days of Stretch and Bobbito — they was in college really when they were putting on with Wu-Tang and Biggie and all them, they were the youngest. But since that era of radio, Angie and Flex, no one this young has had this much of an impact on the culture in this type of period of time. And who has given you Drake, Ice Spice, all on the same platform all while maintaining…yeah, Drake was on the platform, but we’re someone dropping today on the platform who has 4,000 followers on the ‘Gram. Nobody does that. Nobody thinks to do that. 

Gabe: I found [Bronx drill rapper] Kay Flock, I did Kay Flock’s first interview. I found B Lovee and Dougie B, I did their first and only interview where all three of them are together. That was the start of everything. DThang , I brought people DThang, I brought people Ice Spice.

John: Literally broke Ice Spice.

Gabe: Literally broke Ice Spice, you know what I’m saying? I did GloRilla’s first-ever New York City interview, you know what I’m saying? So there’s a lot of things that we’ve done that have just paved the way for a lot of other things.

Tobbylola: And then we’re super humble on top of that. It’s so many platforms. For me, I personally feel like we have a team that’s so grateful.

I think y’all are interesting because there are performances, but then there are also interviews. What is the relationship between the two? Being a media platform that does journalistic work and performance work? Gabe P: I mean, I came up under Angie Martinez and I feel like, I don’t really need to say more than that. I feel like hip-hop media right now is everybody wants clicks. Gabe:

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John: And a lot of that also comes from the niche that we have at On The Radio. You catch somebody young and early, you build that relationship through time and trust through time. So they know what they getting into when they come to you. Like, oh no, that’s my mans, he wouldn’t do that to me . And that’s a fact. He wouldn’t do that to you.

Tobbylola: And let Drake’s previous press run in New York be a testimony that these artists, they want to hit these newer platforms. What y’all need to understand is the music industry is changing. The platforms that are catering to the artists are changing as well. And it’s your best bet to probably adapt to how this industry is changing, rather than hating on the new platforms that are creating their own thing.

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Drake and Lil Yachty Rap With Wolves in New Video for “Another Late Night”: Watch

By Nina Corcoran

Drake has shared a music video for his For All the Dogs song “Another Late Night” with Lil Yachty . Directed by Cole Bennett and filmed over the course of two hours, the visual finds both of the musicians rapping with wolves, dancing in a parking lot, and riding in a Christmas lights-wrapped sports car with a young woman in furry ears. Drake also eagerly holds up a box of McNuggets. Watch it below.

“Another Late Night” is the second song from Drake’s new album to get a music video, following the “ 8am in Charlotte ” clip starring Adonis Graham, his son. (Adonis also drew the album artwork for For All the Dogs .) Ahead of the album’s release, Drake dropped the SZA-featuring “ Slime You Out .” Other guests on For All the Dogs include Bad Bunny, J. Cole, Sexyy Red, Chief Keef, 21 Savage, Teezo Touchdown, Yeat, and PartyNextDoor.

For All the Dogs boasts a few notable samples, too, ranging from Frank Ocean’s “Wiseman” on “Virginia Beach” and Chief Keef’s “I Don’t Like” on “7969 Santa” to the controversial interpolation of Pet Shop Boys’ “West End Girls” on “All the Parties,” which Pet Shop Boys claimed Drake used with “no credit given or permission requested.”

Drake is still in the midst of his It’s All a Blur Tour in support of his joint album with 21 Savage, Her Loss . It was one of two LPs he released in 2022, following Honestly, Nevermind .

Read “ 5 Takeaways From Drake’s New Album For All the Dogs ” on the Pitch.

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The Meaning Behind Drake and Lil Yachty’s “Another Late Night”

O n October 6, Drake not only included “Another Late Night” as the 21st song on the track list for his For All The Dogs album, but he also provided the music video for the track as well. As his second-ever vocal collaboration with Lil Yachty, and his first-ever visual directed by Lyrical Lemonade founder Cole Bennett, “Another Late Night” has a lot of history involved with it.

Seeing both Drake and Yachty deliver melancholic raps over the groovy, synth-filled instrumental, “Another Late Night” is the product of a years-long relationship between the two rappers. This friendship first began in 2020, after the two first worked together on the hit single “Oprah’s Bank Account,” also featuring DaBaby.

“I feel like that was like a one-time thing for me,” Earl On The Beat, the producer of “Orprah’s Bank Account,” told American Songwriter in a recent interview. “But for [Drake] and Yachty, that was the beginning of their relationship, that record.”

Following this, Yachty would go on to earn production credits on four songs from Drake’s 2022 collaborative album with 21 Savage,  Her Loss . On one of the tracks Yachty co-produced with Earl On The Beat, titled “Privileged Rappers.”

[RELATED: Drake and His Father Dennis Graham Slam Joe Budden’s ‘For All The Dogs’ Comments]

Then, when it came to crafting For All The Dogs , Drake finally felt it was time to make another joint song with his new best bud. But, it wasn’t just that Drake wanted to work with Yachty, he also wanted his input on how the album sounded before it came out.

During an episode of his A Safe Place Podcast in early September, Yachty revealed that Drake played him a good chunk of the album to get his opinions. Though Yachty had reservations about the direction Drake was going in, he explained that Drake ultimately convinced him of the vision for FATD , which included “Another Late Night.”

“It’s interesting, it’s coming together a lot better than I thought when I—I just had a talk with him a couple days ago in Vancouver and I was a little worried, ’cause I have a lot of the songs, I don’t have all of ’em, I have a lot of ’em though,” he told A Safe Place co-host Mitch Gone Mad. “And I was just like, ‘Man, I just don’t know if it’s—how are you gon’ put this together? Because it’s like, it’s a lot of  great  songs but they don’t really—in my brain I was like, they didn’t really sound together.

“And then we had a talk about it and he explained to me his thought process about it. And we drove somewhere, we drove to that video shoot which was like an hour away, and we listened to it, and it makes sense now.”

Even more intriguing is that the video shoot Yachty discusses was the one for “Another Late Night,” which took place in Vancouver. When touching on how the video was made, as it includes shots of illuminated trees in a dark forest, director Cole Bennett said that he emphasized privacy for the artists when selecting a location.

“The [Vancouver] location felt the most tucked away and ducked off, and it was surrounded by trees, and it felt like the safest place to do it and a place where the artist could feel comfortable,” Bennett said in a recent interview .

Overall, it seems that Yachty was around Drake frequently while the latter was finishing up For All The Dogs . And, even when it came to songs that weren’t “Another Late Night,” Yachty’s fingerprints ended up being all over the LP, indicating how close the two have become in recent years.

“I don’t think this album is what it is if I don’t get to run everything by you,” Drake told Yachty on his Sirius XM radio show Sound 42 last Thursday (October 5). “If I don’t get to sit in the studio and write with you, and think with you, and if you don’t send me beats, and if you don’t tell me what you believe in or don’t believe in.”

Photo by Prince Williams/Wireimage

The post The Meaning Behind Drake and Lil Yachty’s “Another Late Night” appeared first on American Songwriter .

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A Lil Yachty and Drake joint album could be on the way.

The Atlanta rapper recently caught up with Our Generation Music and revealed that he and Drake discussed a joint project that may happen after the Grammy Award-winning rapper returns from his break from music. “Yea, we talked about it before. It would be nice, right?” Lil Yachty said. “I think he gon’ take a little second to breathe. I’ma take next year and figure out my situation and you know, we’ll look into it in the future. He gon’ take a breath, I’m gon’ press the gas. And then after that, we can see what’s up.” Check out the conversation here .

The pair has collaborated on a few songs over the years, and Lil Yachty was most recently featured on Drake’s hit single “Another Late Night” from his new album, For All the Dogs .

As mentioned above, earlier this month, Drake revealed that he is taking a break from music. The Canadian star plans to focus on his health following the release of his highly anticipated eighth solo studio album. “I probably won’t make music for a little bit,” he said during an episode of his show “Table for One” on SiriusXM’s Sound 42 . “I’m going to be real with you. I need to focus on my health, first and foremost, and I’ll talk about that soon enough. Nothing crazy, but just like, you know, I want people to be healthy in life.”

The Toronto native continued, “I’ve been having the craziest problems for years with my stomach. I’m just saying what it is. So, I need to focus on my health and I need to get right, and I’m going to do that. I have a lot of other things that I would love to focus on. So, I’ma lock the door in the studio for a little bit. I don’t even know what a little bit is. Maybe a year or so, maybe a little longer.”

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Who Is Bobbi Althoff? All About the Influencer Who's Interviewed Drake and Lil Yachty

Bobbi Althoff went viral for interviewing Drake in his bed on her podcast, 'The Really Good Podcast'

Rebecca Aizin is an Editorial Assistant at PEOPLE. She has been working at PEOPLE since 2023. Her work has previously appeared on Elle, HGTV and Backstage. 

Bobbi Althoff went from posting mom content regularly to interviewing famous rappers in a matter of two years.

The 26-year-old influencer began posting videos on TikTok in 2021, mainly focusing on content surrounding her children and her pregnancy experiences. However, she skyrocketed to fame in 2023 when she began her podcast, The Really Good Podcast .

So far, Althoff has interviewed rappers Drake and Lil Yachty , businessman Mark Cuban , actor Rick Glassman and YouTuber Funny Marco, among others.

Known and beloved for her deadpan humor and for intentionally making her interviewees uncomfortable, Althoff has amassed over 7 million TikTok followers and more than 1 million subscribers on her YouTube channel , where she posts her podcast episodes.

However, since her success, some have questioned who Althoff is and how she rose to fame so quickly, prompting rumors that she is an “industry plant” — someone who is secretly being backed by the industry to help them achieve success.

In response to the gossip, Althoff posted a video of herself dancing awkwardly to Nicki Minaj and Ice Spice ’s “Barbie World,” with the caption, “Celebrating because the industry planted me.”

So, who is Bobbi Althoff? Here’s everything to know about the TikTok influencer and podcaster.

She started posting on TikTok in 2021

Althoff began posting regularly on TikTok in 2021, focusing mainly on content surrounding being a mom. Her early TikToks revolved around her pregnancy with her second daughter and motherhood.

In one of her first public TikToks from July 2021, Althoff wrote “when people choose to have their kids in their 20’s instead of waiting till they are at least 35+” over a video of herself mouthing the lyrics to Minaj's "Grindin'." She sings along to the words “dang little mama you is such a loser” repeatedly, seemingly mimicking people who have made comments to her about being a young mom, asking, “Why waste your youth?” in the caption.

She continued posting videos through 2022, mainly of her pregnancy, like clips of her dancing and struggling in the heat at Disneyland .

In the latter, she joked how she was "10 months pregnant" and at the theme park in the June heat.

“I was hoping that I’d be able to walk her out or something but that doesn’t feel like it’s happening,” she said. “She’s never coming, I will be pregnant for the rest of my life and that’s just something I’m going to have to accept.”

Her husband filed for divorce in February 2024

Bobbi and her husband, Cory Althoff, wed on Jan. 31, 2020, and share two children. Sadly, in February 2024, Cory filed for divorce . He listed July 4, 2023, as the date of the couple's separation.

"As sad as I am right now, I am so thankful for the time I got to be his wife," Bobbi wrote on Instagram after the news broke. "While our relationship did not work out as husband and wife, we will always be friends and I will always love him ."

According to his LinkedIn , Cory is a programmer who works as a senior vice president at CompTIA and is a published author of two books about self-teaching computer science and coding.

In April 2023, Cory made a rare appearance on Bobbi’s TikTok as the two made a promotional video for Bounty together. In the video, she talked about how Cory cleans the house — only to reveal she cleans everything after him because he “always misses tiny things.”

“Today I thought it would be a fun idea to talk about our marriage,” Bobbi said in the video. “My husband sleeps downstairs and I sleep upstairs where the children sleep and I take care of them all night long so I’m generally tired so he does all the cleaning.”

On Dave Portnoy's BFFs podcast , Bobbi shared that she doesn't sleep with her husband since she shares her bed with her two kids.

She shares two children with Cory

Althoff has two daughters, whom she refers to as Concrete and Richard, in an effort to keep their names and identities private. While she never shows their faces, she has featured her younger child on her TikTok since the baby was born in June 2022.

In her younger daughter's first appearance, Althoff posted a video of herself just a few weeks after giving birth as she got ready with the newborn to do chores.

“I’m gonna baby wear her so that I can get some laundry done and just get some stuff done around the house,” she said in the TikTok.

Sticking with the bit that she named her daughter Concrete, Althoff responded with a video to a comment in November 2022 of someone critiquing her name choice.

“I don’t see anything wrong with the name Concrete,” she said. “It is a pretty common word so I don’t understand why it would not make a good name. My daughter is going to be a very strong woman with a very strong name for her.”

She continued, “I grew up in the construction business and I just always wanted my daughter to have some ties to myself so yes her name is Concrete Sawdust Althoff so I encourage you guys to think outside the box when naming your children because the future will be a better place if we stop caring about what we name our littles.”

Althoff has since deleted all her videos with her children, explaining on the BFFs podcast that she didn't want them to have a digital footprint.

"I'm so happy I [deleted the videos], especially since I made that decision before [the podcast] because I don't want them to have the digital footprint that I've created," she said. "Now when they go public and they're not with me, I don't have to worry so that's good."

She started her podcast in April 2023

Althoff debuted her podcast, The Really Good Podcast, in April 2023, and one of her first guests was Tammin Sursok, who played Jenna on Pretty Little Liars . Althoff cemented her signature awkward, confrontational style when one of her first questions was, “So you were on a show called Pretty Little Liars . Was the lie that you’re pretty?”

Months later, Althoff revealed on the BFFs podcast that she used to drive to Los Angeles once a week and would pay influencers $300 to join her podcast.

Since then, she has welcomed various other influencers and stars on her podcast, including TikTok star Morgan Presley and Not Dead Yet actor Rick Glassman.

In an April TikTok promoting her podcast, Althoff wrote about how starting a podcast was always a dream of hers.

“I’ve always dreamed of having my own podcast…So I filmed a pilot episode…,” she wrote. “Everyone I showed it to said it was awful..They said I wouldn’t secure celebrity guests anymore…That no one would watch it … But I proved them wrong … It got 6 views and my famous neighbor agreed to do an episode….Don’t give up on your dreams. Ever.”

In an interview with TODAY in August 2023, Althoff said she got the idea to start a podcast using the "dry humor" character she's known for — and emphasized that's not how she is in real life.

A week later, Althoff shared with Cosmopolitan how she doesn't prepare too much for her interviews — but thinks her awkward style is what makes them special.

“ There’s no prep, and that’s the fun of it,” she explained. “I think that’s why celebrities are down to do it. They know it’s a character, and we just wing it. It’s not a real interview. I’m not trying to get hard-hitting information about you — I’m not trying to uncover anything. It’s just a conversation. It’s really a parody of a good interview.”

She interviewed Drake and Lil Yachty in July 2023

After over 2 million views on her interview with YouTuber Funny Marco, Althoff had already gone viral. But her fame escalated when she teased that the next episode of her podcast would be with Drake.

On TODAY, Althoff said that the interview came about when Drake saw her episode with Funny Marco and liked the video and followed her.

"When I saw he followed me, I was like I'm gonna ask," she said. She proceeded to direct message him, and three days later, she was interviewing him in bed.

Her full 1-hour long interview on YouTube, which was released on July 20, 2023, garnered over 9 million views. During her conversation with the star, Althoff maintained her stoic, quiet tone the entire time and did not appear impressed with Drake — nor the fact that they were conducting the interview in a bed.

"The idea behind it was it would be a funny thing that you wanted to do it so bad that you bothered him while he was going to bed to do it," she explained on TODAY. "Now we do all my podcasts in random locations."

During one particularly jokingly tense moment, Althoff asked Drake not to drink while she interviews him.

“It’s a nightcap!” he said.

“It’s sad,” she replied.  

Just weeks after she interviewed Drake, however, fans noticed that the Certified Lover Boy rapper and the podcast host had unfollowed each other on Instagram, and Althoff took down her interview with him from all her platforms.

The unfollowing came just days after Althoff posted a TikTok of herself attending Drake's concert in L.A. where she stood in the crowd with her arms crossed with her signature deadpan expression as people danced around her. “Really in my element @ this guy’s concert,” she jokingly captioned the post. 

In July 2023, Althoff also posted another hour-long interview with rapper Lil Yachty where the two joked about being young parents, fame and their careers. In the middle of the interview, Drake even called Lil Yachty and shouted hello to Althoff. 

“What’s up Bobbo?” Drake said as Lil Yachty turned the phone toward her.

In August 2023, she interviewed Mark Cuban.

She shared that her podcast popping off was "crazy." "I always wanted it to blow up obviously, you hope for something but it's crazy when it actually happens," she said.

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Lil Yachty's Concrete Boys Drop New Banger "FAMILY BUSINESS"

Yachty is once again showing off the young talent on his label.

Last year, Lil Yachty launched his new label CONCRETE BOYS under Quality Control. He's already gotten to work on filling out the roster with impressive young talent and has a new compilation on the way to help show off their talents. Last year the label dropped "MO JAMS" which came with the announcement of the upcoming compilation tape, even though the song isn't expected to appear on it. But now were finally getting a taste of some of Yachty's artists.

Lil Yachty himself is joined by CAMO and KARRAHBOOO on the absolute banger of a new song "FAMILY BUSINESS." The track also comes with an accompanying music video that is heavily stylized. It featured the various label members in matching baggy red shirts and big jeans in a variety of locations like a living room and outside a gas station. The description for the song also includes a link to pre-order the upcoming full label compilation, which also won't include this new song. It officially confirms that the album will drop pretty soon, hitting streaming on April 5.

Read More: Lil Yachty Drops By For His "On The Radar Freestyle"

Lil Yachty And Concrete Boys' "FAMILY BUSINESS"

Lil Yachty just appeared on another new single from an up-and-coming talent. He teamed up with breakthrough TikTok star NEMZZZ for a sentimental new single called "IT'S US." That came just a few weeks after he teamed up with one of the breakthrough stars of electronica in 2023. Fred Again... had a massive year last year and kicked off his 2024 with the track "Stayinit" which featured an appearance from Yachty . What do you think of the new single from Lil Yachty's label Concrete Boyz? Are there any members of the group that you think have breakout potential? Let us know in the comment section below.

Read More: Lil Yachty Divulges On Potential Drake Collab Album

Quotable Lyrics: Two pints, just Teezo Touchdown'd, I'm finna pour 'em both Geekin' off two X pills, my b*tch look like kaleidoscope I don't trip 'bout much, play 'bout my money or pints, I gotta fold you He such a stand up guy, how they f*ck him over?

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Lil Yachty Launches His Label Concrete Rekordz, Backed By Quality Control And K-Pop Machine HYBE

Lil Yachty has been everywhere lately, collaborating with both major stars like Drake and J. Cole and rising stars like JID and Nemzzz . Now, he’s taking yet another step in furthering his rap dominance, announcing the launch of his new label, Concrete Rekordz. The label is named after his crew, Concrete Boys, who also comprise the roster, and is backed by the label that originally signed Yachty, Quality Control Music .

An additional wrinkle is that Quality Control is now owned by HYBE America , the stateside arm of the Korean entertainment company responsible for the success of K-pop groups like BTS, New Jeans, Seventeen, and Tomorrow X Together. In other words, there’s some serious muscle behind Concrete Rekordz, which accompanied the launch with the release of their new video for “Family Business.”

The Concrete Boys crew consists of Camo!, DC2TRILL, Draft Day, and Karrahbooo, who accompanied Yachty on his 2023 Field Trip Tour .

In a press release, Quality Control COO “Coach K” Lee said, “Yachty has always had profound vision since the day we met and to see him take his curatorial magic and expand it to discover and enhance other artists is exciting to me.” Meanwhile, his co-founder, QC CEO Pierre “P” Thomas, said, “I’m excited to see Yachty step into the role of executive alongside being one of the most formidable creatives in the world with such an eye for talent. Karrahbooo is a star and they are all going to be the new wave of cool that can bring something different to the culture that is so badly needed.”

You can check out the video for “Family Business” above.

Drake Talks ‘For All the Dogs,’ Life on Tour, and Taking a Health Break

Listen to his show only on SiriusXM.

“How can I describe this album [ For All the Dogs ] to you?” Drake said last night during a new episode of his exclusive SiriusXM Sound 42 show, Table for One . “I’ll keep it short and sweet: Please don’t ask me what I feel if you can’t handle the real … That’s probably the alternate album title, too.”

Listen to Drake’s new episode of  Table for One  exclusively on the SiriusXM App

“I just got out of the studio. Fourth quarter magic, me and [J.] Cole going crazy,” Drake said as he began his live broadcast from Ristorante Sotto Sotto in Toronto.

“I’m very, very proud. I’m very, very grateful that any of you are still interested in even listening to what the boy’s got to say,” he continued. “And I hope that we’ll find common ground once again. I do think you’re going to really enjoy this. I think I did my f****** job, if I do say so myself.”

For All the Dogs , Drake’s eighth studio album following 2022’s  Honestly, Nevermind , dropped today (October 6). The album’s 23 tracks include the two previously-released singles “Slime You Out” and “8AM in Charlotte.”

“I hope that these songs are songs that you can enjoy, and you can tell people that they’re about somebody else,” Drake told listeners.

Drake Gives a Health Update

Now that  For All the Dogs is out, Drake slipped in a warning for fans that he “probably won’t make music for a little bit” — but for an important reason.

He explained, “I got some other things I need to do for some other people that I made promises to. I’m going to be real with you, I need to focus on my health, first and foremost … I’ve been having the craziest problems for years with my stomach.”

Therefore, he’s planning to “lock the door on the studio for a little bit” so he can take the time “get right.”

“I don’t even know what a little bit is. Maybe a year or something, maybe a little longer,” Drake added.

How the It’s All a Blur Tour Affected Drake

Drake and 21 Savage wrap up their co-headlining tour this month, which started back in July and consisted of over 50 dates across North America.

“I have a tough time understanding it. I think I’m overwhelmed by the love from tour,” Drake continued on  Table for One . “I have a tough time understanding why my mind, when it’s overworking itself, why my mind is something that’s intriguing to any of you. But damn, I’m so happy that it is.”

The tour featured guests like J. Cole and Travis Scott, with support acts including Skillibeng, Sleepy Hallow, Central Cee, Sexyy Red, Zack Bia, and Lil Yachty — the last of whom even called in to Drake’s show last night.

“I’m nothing without all of your opinions, all of your critiques, and all of your feelings and emotions,” Drake told his fans. “When I’m right or when I’m wrong, or when you’re right or when you’re wrong, it doesn’t really matter. It’s just, we’re a merger.”

Lil Yachty Thinks Drake’s Drunk

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Sound 42 (Ch. 42) is the vision of multi-platinum recording artist and OVO Sound Co-founder Drake. A radio experience reflecting his interests in music and culture from all walks of life. Expect boundary-pushing hip hop and R&B alongside global vibes from the Caribbean, Latin America, The U.K. and beyond. The channel’s flagship show is OVO Sound Radio a weekly, “musical art gallery” hosted and curated by OVO Co-Founder Oliver El-Khatib.

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The Kendrick Lamar/Drake Beef, Explained

By Frazier Tharpe

It’s been a minute since we've had a good ol’ fashioned rap beef, but Kendrick Lamar just firmly and decidedly thawed his Cold War with Drake all the way out—not with a spicy Instagram Live or tweets, but with straight bars . To quote prime Jigga-era Jay-Z , “the summer’s bout to get hot.”

Future and Metro Boomin’s decade-in-the-making new album We Don’t Trust You was already one of the most feverishly anticipated rap releases in some time, and on the song “Like That,” Kendrick delivers on that Christmas Eve energy with a guest verse that may as well be a “Control” sequel. But whereas that name-naming 2013 landmark was ultimately rooted in the spirit of competition, this time the gloves are off and the love is done.

Kendrick sets the tone early, declaring that he’s “choosing violence” and it’s time for an opponent to “prove that he’s a problem.” And though no names are officially named, a reference to Drake’s song “First Person Shooter” and the album it lives on, For All the Dogs, means we have to consider this something more than a subliminal. On “FPS” Drake brags about taking Michael Jackson’s mantle for having the most Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 songs, going as far as to hit the “Beat It” steps with a sequined glove in the video. Here, Kendrick finally, formally casts himself as direct opposition, ending his verse with a haymaker referencing MJ’s own longtime Cold War enemy: “Prince outlived Mike Jack.” Sheesh.

Kendrick and Drake have a complicated history, with over 10 years' worth of static. As fanfare around Kendrick Lamar grew, Drake was quick to embrace him, giving Kendrick his own interlude on his 2011 album Take Care and bringing him along for the subsequent Club Paradise tour (which also included J. Cole, A$AP Rocky, Meek Mill, 2 Chainz, Waka Flocka Flame, and others.) But even on that song, “Buried Alive,” tension was in the air, with Kendrick recounting his thoughts while receiving game during a meeting with Drake—then the more established in the industry at that point—and admitting to being irritated by Drake's success.

Nevertheless they linked up for the excellent “Poetic Justice” on Kendrick’s seminal good kid, M.a.a.d. City album—but the collaborative vibes stopped a year later, after Drake was one of the many peers Kendrick named in his timeline-stopping, call-to-arms verse on Big Sean’s “Control.” A month or two after that moment, Drake dropped Nothing Was the Same , and in an interview with Elliott Wilson , slickly managed to give Kendrick his props while dismissing the verse at the same time. Fast forward a month, to a cypher at the 2013 BET Hip-Hop Awards where Kendrick Lamar rapped “Nothing’s been the same since they dropped ‘Control’/and tucked the sensitive rapper back in his pajama clothes.” Two months later: Drake hops on a remix to Future’s titanic “Sh!t” and ends his verse with “Fuckn-ggas, gon be fuckn-ggas/that’s why we never gave a fuck/when a fuckn-gga switched up.”

A little over 10 years later, a Future song sampling Three 6 Mafia (whose influence continues to have a stranglehold on the game) is once again the stage for a response. The decade in between has been rife with subliminals, references that could be reasonably taken as warning shots but easily disavowed as harmless if either artist was asked. A spicy allusion to rappers using ghostwriters just months before that whole scandal broke out here . A charged “I put him on MY tour” reminder there . “The Language,” “Element,” “Deep Water,” “100” —all reasonably diss canon but never made official. (To say nothing of Kendrick and his cousin Baby Keem’s “The Hillbillies” conspicuously aping Drake’s “Sticky” flow, or Drake saying he can't be like “one of those guys” who only drops albums every three to five years when announcing For All the Dogs .) NFL star Marcellus Wiley once claimed he bore witness to one of the rappers taking it there when asked about the situation during an ESPN SportsNation interview, but cooler heads prevailed, the rapper's team had the interview buried and to this day we don't know which of the two it was.

By Jon Gugala

By Calum Marsh

By Alex Hoyt

In the midst of playing United States vs. Soviet Union, though, both rappers maintained a close relationship with Germany, i.e. J. Cole. Kendrick and Cole have yet to make a rap forum dream a reality with their long-alluded-to collab album (we’ll always have this , though) but stayed in communication on wax in other ways, like Kendrick handling hook duty on Cole’s “Under the Sun” or that time they did a beat swap and freestyle over each other’s songs on Black Friday . Cole and Drake, meanwhile, have always been upfront about maintaining a real friendship outside of rap, but finally doubled down on that on wax with not one but two collaborations last year (their first songs together in 10 years) and Cole joining Drake’s nationwide tour for several dates.

In another interview with Wilson, this time alongside Brian “B.Dot” Miller at the tail end of the last decade, Drake mused that the next 10 years would be the time for him, Kendrick and Cole really show and prove who’s built to last. Cole made the subtext plain on a 2021 freestyle over Drake’s then-new song “Pipe Down,” rapping “Some people say that I'm running third, they threw the bronze at me/Behind Drake and Dot, yeah, them n-ggas is superstars to me.” He leans into it even harder in his verse on Drake’s “First Person Shooter” with “Love when they argue the hardest MC/Is it K-Dot? Is it Aubrey? Or me?/We The Big Three, like we started a league.”

On “Like That,” Kendrick is feeling a lot less kumbaya, rapping “Motherfuck the Big Three, it’s just Big Me.” Between that and dismissively observing that “n-ggas cliquin up” earlier in the verse, some could argue that the song also functions as a J. Cole diss as well as Drake. But you could just as easily say the same about Cole’s recent statements that he’s out to prove he’s the best, as he preps his long-awaited album The Fall Off , a Black Album -esque manifesto he’s crafting to ostensibly end all debate. After all, that Big Three line on “First Person Shooter” does end with Cole declaring himself Muhammed Ali, a sentiment he's been doubling down on in one stellar verse after another for the last few years. He clarified in an interview with Lil Yachty that he never once awarded himself the bronze medal, just merely acknowledged that it was a rampant perception. So in theory, the new Kendrick lines could be received by Cole as the same spirit of competition that he’s been preaching.

But we’ve gone hundreds of words without returning to the duo who delivered this moment: Future, the fourth face on that 2010s Rap Mount Rushmore, and Metro Boomin, the superproducer he’s made some of his most potent music with. There’s a deeper layer to Kendrick choosing a Future and Metro album as the stage to finally go at Drake: Metro has seemingly had his own problems with the 6ix God. Late last year he posted and subsequently deleted a tweet about his acclaimed album Heroes and Villains continuing to lose awards to Drake (and frequent Metro collaborator 21 Savage’s) album Her Loss . During a livestream not long after, Drake hilariously referenced “the non-believers, the underachievers, the tweet-and-deleters,” adding “you guys make me sick to my stomach, fam.” Despite trading a few more subliminal potshots across Twitter and IG , Metro downplayed any beef, saying that the issue was “not deep at all.”

Still, when eagle-eyed fans took note of Metro unfollowing Drake on Instagram—the definitive 21st century signpost of an un-amicable split—ahead of the album’s release, it didn’t take a hip-hop scholar to assume that, as Kendrick would declare, “it’s up.” And for those wondering how a producer-rapper beef would even reasonably play out, Metro makes it clear by serving up a new creative peak on “Like That,” with an obscenely screwface-inducing beat sampling Three 6 Mafia’s “Who the Crunkest” (which itself sampled 80s rap duo Rodney O and Joe Cooley), alongside Eazy-E's classic “Eazy Duz It” as well as a splash of “Ridin Spinners.” In effect Kendrick and Metro are following playbooks beloved by the likes of Jay-Z before them, or even Drake with “Back to Back,” in dissing your opponent on a song that’s an undeniable banger whether people know the context or not.

But why would Future, who has approximately 30 ( thirty ) collaborations with Drake, including the 2015 collab album What a Time to Be Alive and two fairly recent tracks on Future’s last solo album, cede airtime on his new project to a noted Drake enemy? No one knows for sure at press time, but it’s possible they have issues of their own. Despite their prolific collaborations, their relationship has had its rough moments from day one. Recall 2011, when an ascendant Future got an assist from Drake remixing the former’s “Tony Montana,” only to publicly bemoan Drake refusing to do a video . And while they toured together in 2016, who can forget that time in 2013 when Future was briefly, allegedly booted off of Drake’s tour for less-than-flattering comments about his music in an interview.

Factor in the name of the album, and Future’s rap on the intro about someone who’s his number one fan despite sneak dissing him on the side, and you don’t need that big of a tinfoil hat to make the leap. Any opinions on the current status of Future and Drake’s relationship is all baseless conjecture for now, but what is irrefutable is that rap beef is geopolitics. One would imagine Drake, who on the chorus of a recent track cheekily wonders what Pluto (Future) would do in a certain romantic situation (answer: not safe for work), wouldn’t simply shrug at one of his most frequent collaborators releasing a project with space reserved for direct shots at him. (That would be like 21 Savage letting Pusha T hop on a track.)

It’ll be interesting to see how this all unfolds, but while it’s understandably taking up a lot of oxygen on the timeline right now, one thing we shouldn’t lose sight of is that We Don’t Trust You is, quite simply, incredible. Sure, beef is cool but so is Future reverting to some of his most historically depraved peaks earlier on the track—do not listen closely if you don’t want to hear specifics of the X-rated scenario that may absolve him of one of his 20 carat rings. He’s blacking out mostly everywhere else on the album even harder; 2022’s I Never Liked You is a great album, but We Don’t Trust You arrives immediately battling for an even higher spot in his storied discography. The same can be said for Metro’s beats; I yelled just as loudly as I did at Kendrick on “Like That” later on at the surprise Rick Ross verse as he glides on the soulful, escalating beat for “Everyday Hustle” ... only for the beat to morph a third time as Future returns to take the reins.

Metro’s been talking this album up for the better part of a year, directly acknowledging the high standard set by his and Future’s past work as a unit. They’ve cleared that bar and then some, shaking the rap game up in the process, securing a top slot for a summer outside and any Best Of lists. Silencing all doubters with the music, casting oneself as a step ahead of the competition: it’s energy the late, great Mobb Deep rapper Prodigy would appreciate, which is perhaps why the album is peppered with gripping soundbites from some of his past interviews.

New beef and a handful of great mainstream rap records all before Easter? I thought it was a drought.

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Lil Yachty Launches Concrete Rekordz in Partnership with Quality Control/HYBE

Hip-hop sensation Lil Yachty unveils his latest venture, Concrete Rekordz, in collaboration with Quality Control Music/HYBE. The announcement coincides with the release of the music video “Family Business” by Concrete Boys’ Karrahbooo and Camo!.

Concrete Rekordz will serve as the home for Concrete Boys, comprising Lil Yachty, Karrahbooo, DC2TRILL, Draft Day, and Camo!. Their debut compilation album, “It’s Us Volume 1,” is slated for release on April 5th.

Introduced during Lil Yachty’s The Field Trip Tour, Concrete Boys gained rapid traction with their single “MO JAMS,” amassing over 2 million views on YouTube. With Lil Yachty’s guidance, the group is poised to make waves as culture shifters in the music industry.

Beyond his rap career, Lil Yachty assumes the role of record label executive with Concrete Rekordz, further contributing to the growth of Quality Control Music/HYBE. With their combined efforts, the label aims to continue shaping the future of hip-hop and beyond.

Speaking on the collaboration, Quality Control Music COO and co-founder Kevin “Coach K” Lee said, “Yachty has always had profound vision since the day we met and to see him take his curatorial magic and expand it to discover and enhance other artists is exciting to me. ”

Label CEO and co-founder Pierre “P” Thomas also adds, “I’m excited to see Yachty step into the role of executive alongside being one of the most formidable creatives in the world with such an eye for talent. Karrahbooo is a star and they are all going to be the new wave of cool that can bring something different to the culture that is so badly needed.”  

You can see the video for “Family Business” below.

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Beyoncé’s ‘Cowboy Carter’ Features Miley Cyrus and Post Malone, With Guests Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson

Also on the album: Shaboozey, Tanner Adell and Willie Jones, plus country music pioneer Linda Martell.

By Thania Garcia

Thania Garcia

• Music Industry Moves: Jay Marciano of AEG Presents to Receive City of Hope’s Spirit of Life Award 15 mins ago
• Beyoncé’s Best Lyrics on ‘Cowboy Carter’ — From ‘John Wayne’-ing That Ass to Warning ‘Jolene’ to Find Her Own Man 3 hours ago
• Beyoncé’s ‘Cowboy Carter’ Features Miley Cyrus and Post Malone, With Guests Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson 1 day ago

New details about Beyoncé ’s incoming “Cowboy Carter,” out tonight (March 29), have emerged following yesterday’s tracklist reveal .

The follow-up to Beyoncé’s “Renaissance” features Post Malone on the song “Levii’s Jeans,” while Miley Cyrus lends her vocals for “II Most Wanted.” In addition, Dolly Parton appears in an interlude, as does Willie Nelson and Linda Martell, the first black female solo artist to play the Grand Ole Opry.

“Cowboy Carter” also touts a cover of the Beatles’ “White Album” hit “Blackbird,” which Paul McCartney wrote to address the racial strife in the American South in the 1960s. Country singer-songwriter Tanner Adell is prominently featured on the cover (stylized as “Blackbiird” on the album), along with Tiera Kennedy, Reyna Roberts and Brittney Spencer.

As for other guests, Willie Jones is featured on “Just For Fun,” and hip-hop and Americana singer Shaboozey is on the tracks “Spaghettii” and “Sweet Honey Buckin’.” These confirmations debunk the long list of rumored guests for “Cowboy Carter” that ranged from Taylor Swift to Travis Scott.

Beyoncé’s new album was preceded by the surprise drop of singles “Texas Hold ‘Em” and “16 Carriages” during the Super Bowl. “Cowboy Carter” is the long-awaited “Act II” of 2022’s “Renaissance,” which the singer initially revealed would be a three-part project. The album’s first two singles comprised collaborations with Raphael Saadiq, Robert Randolph and Rhiannon Giddens.

In a post shared to Beyoncè’s social media last week, the singer said her journey to “Cowboy Carter” started five years ago, when she was inspired to dig into the genre after an incident where she did not feel “welcomed.”

In a long note posted on Instagram, Beyoncé explained that this incident inspired her to study the origins of country music. “It was born out of an experience that I had years ago where I did not feel welcomed… and it was very clear that I wasn’t,” she said. “But, because of that experience, I did a deeper dive into the history of Country music and studied our rich musical archive.”

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Kendrick Lamar Just Dissed Drake and J. Cole. Here’s Why.

Kendrick Lamar sent shots at Drake and J. Cole on “Like That.” Here’s a breakdown of the diss and a full explanation of how we got here.

Kendrick Lamar just sent shots at both Drake and J. Cole .

On Future and Metro Boomin’s new album We Don’t Trust You, Kendrick dedicates his “Like That” verse to refuting the concept of rap’s “Big 3,” commenting on Drake’s “sneaking dissing,” and poking fun at the Drake-Cole collab “First Person Shooter.”

On “Like That,” Metro cleverly samples Eazy E’s “Eazy-Duz-It” to set the stage for Kendrick, who gets everything off his chest about the cold war that’s been brewing between him and Drake over the past decade . The track is riddled with elite wordplay and real rapping, but the road to this diss record feels sudden. Here’s a breakdown of how we got here.

What did Kendrick say and what does it mean?

View this video on YouTube

Kendrick did not mince his words on “Like That,” sending several direct shots at Drake and some subliminals for J. Cole.

Midway through the verse, Kendrick raps, “Fuck sneak dissin', ‘First Person Shooter,’ I hope they came with three switches,” referencing Drake and Cole’s collaborative track on For All The Dogs . Kendrick is calling out how Drake notoriously loves sending subliminal shots without dropping names in his disses, and Cole gets included in the diss because of how Kendrick says he “hopes they came with three switches.” It seems Kendrick hasn’t enjoyed seeing Drake and Cole forming such a close public alliance recently, going on tour together and constantly praising each other, so he includes bars like, “Niggas clickin' up, but cannot be legit.”

Kendrick goes on to rap, “Motherfuck the ‘Big 3,’ nigga, it’s just big me/I’m really like that/And your best work is a light pack/Nigga, Prince outlived Mike Jack.”

Here, he overtly rejects the concept of the “Big 3” narrative that positions Drake, Cole, and Kendrick as the three best rappers alive , choosing instead to crown himself as the lone king, like he’s done before . He also shits on Drake’s discography by calling his best project a “light pack,” before slyly using Drake’s affinity for Michael Jackson against him by likening himself to Prince, another music legend who lived longer, before closing the verse with his most clever wordplay on the track: “For all your dogs getting buried/That’s a K with all these 9s, he ‘gon see Pet Semetary. ” The “K” and “9” refer to Kendrick’s initial and a 9-millimeter gun, as well as “canine,” which connects to his previous line that’s about Drake’s For All The Dogs album . 

The verse is littered with shots at Drake. Earlier in the verse, Kendrick raps, “D-O-T, the money, power, respect/The last one better/It’s a lot of goofies with a check,” calling back the iconic LOX song, but also saying that respect is more important than money and power, leading to a double entendre about “a lot of goofies with a check,” which references Drake’s Nike endorsement.

Why did he come after Drake and Cole now?

Drake and J. Cole have been friends for a long time (remember the video of them buying hundreds of copies of Born Sinner at Target a decade ago?) but they’ve been spending much more time together ever since Drake performed at Dreamville Fest 2023 . On tour together over the last few months, they’ve given each other flowers onstage several times, and their No. 1 record “First Person Shooter” features a hook that’s focused entirely on how Drake and Cole are “as big as the Super Bowl.” Kendrick hasn’t dropped any new solo music since 2022’s Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers, and given how active both Drake and Cole have been over the last two years, the conversation of the “Big 3” has become more squarely focused on these Big 2 recently, which might have fired up Kendrick’s competitive energy and pulled him away from those backyard workouts .

Why do Kendrick and Drake have tensions?

The cold war between Drake and Kendrick Lamar has been bubbling for a long time now, dating all the way back to 2013 when Kendrick dropped “Control” and Drake seemingly sent a subliminal at him later that year on “The Language” when he rapped, “I don’t know why that they been lyin/ But your shit is not that inspirin.” Kendrick immediately shot back during TDE’s 2013 BET Cypher when he said, “And nothing’s been the same since they dropped ‘Control’ and tucked the sensitive rapper back in his pajama clothes.” 

Ever since then, there have been back-and-forth subliminals between the two for years, and some fans have theorized that Drake’s recent comments about not wanting to take a break from music in the form of “super-lengthy disappearances for the sake of mystery” might have been a shot at Kendrick, who is famously mysterious and even said that he had gone “months without a phone” during his time away from the public eye before dropping Mr. Morales & The Big Steppers . These guys have been very competitive with each other for the majority of their careers, and these petty jabs have now culminated in Kendrick sending direct shots at Drake.

Why did Cole get dissed, too?

Cole catching a stray in a Kendrick diss primarily focused on Drake reminds me of that 50 Cent “Why he say fuck me” meme, because it feels so random at first glance. Drake and Dot have a volatile history, but Cole and Kendrick have always been relatively friendly with each other. They’ve worked together multiple times over the years, most recently in 2019 when Kendrick lent his vocals for the Revenge of the Dreamers 3 intro “Under the Sun.” Cole also gave Kendrick praise during his visit to Lil Yachty’s A Safe Space podcast in November 2023, saying that he would “never verbally say he’s bigger than any of them niggas because I respect the swords, I know what they are capable of at all times” while discussing the “Big 3” debate and where he thinks he stands amongst them. 

Kendrick likely sent shots at Cole because of his proximity to Drake. On 2023’s “Evil Ways,” Cole raps, “High up in arenas where they see they favs/AKA me and Drizzy Drake, we the wave,” which could be perceived as Cole leaving Kendrick out of the conversation. However, while Drake made a point to emphasize how he and Cole are at the top of the rap game on “First Person Shooter,” Cole makes sure to acknowledge Kendrick on the same song, rapping, “Love when they argue the hardest MC/Is it K Dot? Is it Aubrey? Or me?/ We the Big 3 like we started a league.” So he might just be guilty by association in this situation. 

Some fans are theorizing that Cole may have sent subliminal shots at Kendrick elsewhere on the song when he rapped, “Everybody steppers, well, fuck it, then everybody breakfast/And I’m bout to clear up my plate,” which could potentially be a reference to Kendrick’s Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers. But that feels like a reach, because Cole spoke positively about Dot earlier in the verse, and also gave him props in Lil Yachty’s podcast which was released after the song had come out. 

Is Future beefing with Drake, too?

Fans are speculating that the title track of We Don’t Trust You includes shots at Drake from Future, who repeats, “Fake written all over you/Hate written all over you” throughout the song. At first glance, these lines could refer to literally anyone who has crossed Future, but in the second verse, he raps, “You a nigga number one fan dog/Sneak dissin, I don’t understand dog/Pillow talkin, actin like a fed dog/I don’t need another fake friend dog,” which is clearly aimed at someone more specific, and people think it’s Drake. 

The two of them have been close for a very long time, so Future could be referencing Drake when talking about “fake friends,” and the Toronto rapper has a history of so-called “sneak dissing” in his songs and on social media. This is all speculative, but considering the recent beef between Metro Boomin and Drake , and the fact that Future allowed Kendrick’s diss to be on his album, the fans might be on to something here.

Why is Metro Boomin in the middle of it all?

Metro Boomin and Drake have been quietly feuding for months now, even though the Atlanta producer claimed he had no problems with the OVO rapper at the end of last year. "Are u and Drake seriously beefing or is it not that deep," a fan asked Metro in a since-deleted series of tweets. Metro responded by saying, "Not deep at all lmao," but based on the lyrics in We Don’t Trust You, these sentiments clearly didn’t last. 

Back in December, Metro tweeted and deleted criticism about award shows, clearly upset that Drake and 21 Savage’s Her Loss won more awards than his album Heroes & Villains . "Her Loss still keeps winning rap album of the year over H&V,” Metro tweeted. “Proof that award shows are just politics and not for me. Idc about awards honestly, the true award and REWARD is knowing that the music I spend so much time on brings joy to peoples everyday lives."

Drake responded to these comments in a livestream shortly after, calling out all of the tweet-and-deleters. “And to the rest of you,” he said, “the non-believers, the underachievers, the tweet-and-deleters, you guys make me sick to my stomach, fam.” The two have since unfollowed each other on social media as well.

Metro hasn’t sent any direct shots at J. Cole, but fans have unearthed a tweet from 2011 where Metro called Cole’s music boring. “Don’t get me wrong. J. Cole is talented,” he tweeted at the time. “Anytime I can’t sleep , Friday Night Lights puts a nigga out cold. Sleep on track 1.” That was over a decade ago, however, and in Cole’s first Might Delete Later vlog , he revealed that he was in the studio at the same time as Metro, and even made a point to compliment the producer’s well-crafted beats, so it’s unclear if the two still have any lingering issues.

What’s going to happen next?

This is anyone’s guess, but if Drake’s history with rap beefs has taught us anything, he never forgets anything and he’s usually not afraid to fire back in some way. It wouldn’t be surprising if Drake addressed Kendrick’s bars (and possibly his strained relationship with Future and Metro) during the next stop on his tour with J. Cole. 

He could even go the “Duppy Freestyle” route and let an entire song fly. If that does happen, it could spark an exciting back-and-forth between Kendrick and Drake, something Dot has likely been waiting for after years of trading subliminals. This verse feels strategic on Kendrick’s part, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s already prepared to respond if Drake fires back.

As for Cole, he has been on a ridiculous feature run over the last few years and it looks like he’s been gearing up for his next studio album, The Fall Off, so he’s in prime shape for any kind of lyrical sparring. “Like That” wasn’t really directed at him as much as it was at Drake (and he’s had a strong relationship with Kendrick up until this point) so I predict Dot will get a phone call from Cole before he gets a verse. 

Regardless, it’s always great for hip-hop whenever the biggest rappers in the game are actively challenging each other, and moments like this are bringing the exact kind of energy to the genre that it needs right now.

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