Last Friday, following the release of his latest LP, Kanye West, in his own distinct, eccentric fashion, called game.
Following seven days worth of theatrics amongst some of hip-hop’s most popular artists, it seems to have come to a rather underwhelming close.
West took to Twitter, as he’s been avidly doing amid the rollout of his latest project, in order to come out and declare, “This is over now.”
And while Pusha T remains at the helm of all G.O.O.D Music oriented decisions, he decided to follow suit, retweeting Kanye’s submission, whatever that counts for. And considering these two have been going at it for quite some time now, it shouldn’t count for all that much.
If you’re reading this (no pun intended), it’s presumable that you have heard of all these cuts that swept their way across the internet and tarnished shards of legacy along the ride.
For starters, the track that brought this whole debacle back into shape was “Infrared,” the outro to Pusha T’s “Daytona,” his newest, minimalistic collage of drug slinging and eloquent speaking.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ytzc6ehAvOM
This was the initial song that revitalized bad blood between the two since Drake’s expressive throwaway track, “Two Birds, One Stone,” back in 2016. Pusha T brought Quentin Miller’s infamous ghostwriting in to question (“It was written like Nas, but it came from Quinten”), as well as throwing rap mogul Lil Wayne in to the mix (“He see what I see when you see Wayne on tour / Flash without fire / Another multi-platinum rapper trapped and can’t retire”).
In retrospect, this song played the role of what should now be referred to as “Drake Bait,” or “Drait.” It is a common fact that Drake will let absolutely no Lil Wayne slander, as he made known on 5 a.m. in Toronto back in 2013 (“Weezy been on the edge, you niggas just need to chill / If anything happened to Papi night pop a nigga for real”).
That, alongside the ghostwriting accusations which sparked the Meek Mill quarrel and his dead of night ether, was all Aubrey needed to hear in order to get in the booth and unload a full clip.
That clip came in the form of “Duppy Freestyle,” a three-minute therapy session in which Drake came out to the forefront and expressed his disdain from the opening seconds, in what was an onslaught of pent-up anger, paranoia and hostility.
He started things off with a jab at both Pusha T and West (“What do you really think of the nigga that’s makin’ your beats? / I’ve done things for him I thought that he never would need / Father had to stretch his hands out and get it from me), addressing the paradox there is behind the fact Drake literally wrote songs for Kanye in the past only for it to be thrown back his face.
He wrapped it all up with, “It’s gonna be a cruel summer for you / I told Weezy and Baby, ‘I’ma done him for you.’ / Tell ‘Ye we got a invoice comin’ to you / Considerin’ that we just sold another twenty for you”. Mind you, the invoice did show up, following a request by none other than Pusha T himself. Again, via Twitter, which is starting to getting annoying.
On the day of release, which coincided with “Daytona,” the timely consensus was that Drake had won. But, somewhere deep down, nobody expected it to be that simple. From Common to Joe Budden, all artists that have aimed for the rapper’s head (literally speaking, even Chris Brown).
Yet the Torontonian has never found himself trading spars with another artist as ruthless as the guy who has a cocaine reference for nearly every single situation. That doesn’t include Kendrick, due to the fact that their exchange of blows never came down to this point.
So, here’s where the whole ruthless thing comes in to play. In what was arguably the most belligerent diss track in God-knows-how-long, King Push aims for every insecurity (“Let’s examine why / Your music for the past few years has been angry and full of lies”), alleged baby mama rumor (“Sophie knows better as your baby mother”) and Steve Harvey suit that his dad wea — wait a second.
Baby mama rumor, eh? Hiding your child named Adonis who was allegedly meant to be bestowed upon the planet alongside a line of Adidas sneakers titled “AdiDon,” eh? That is, uh, news. Hell, it’s huge news, taking into account the fact that he is leaving Jordan after what seemed to be a successful run of collaborations.
Maybe he decided to take the Kanye route and seek more creative control to push his baby into the forefront, but I don’t think that this whole line is still going to come in to fruition after it got spoiled so rottenly.
I didn’t even mention the song cover yet; but, hey, at least Drake remembered to respond to that, right?
This question is for the Canadian mogul himself, as I genuinely ponder what happened to writing the book on calculated thinking or on never placing second. I would’ve figured that the “you lose some / you win some” Drake of yesteryear has been washed away by fat Apple contracts and stadium shows by now, though it seems that’s who might have stepped back into the fray following all this.
Even Kanye got in on the action for a short segment on “ye,” as he lightheartedly snapped on “No Mistakes” (“Too close to snipe you / Truth told, you I like you / Too bold to type you / Calm down, you light skin”).
The sniping comment is in reference to the fact that they live two streets down from one another, and the following is based on the two of them being on good terms over the last couple of years, making this a complete bar and a half, if we’re being completely honest here.
Ultimately, it seems as if the one thing about Drake that has shifted globally in the past couple of weeks is his character.
Although there are the cliched critiques that he is a culture vulture with a soft side who doesn’t write his own songs, and whatever other forms of slander that any globally-renowned artist has to hear, the term “deadbeat” can sure knock someone down a couple of notches. And this is coming from a former stan of his.
And while there has been constant bickering from countless camps regarding why a response wasn’t released and what other dirt there is on whoever potentially gets hazed next, it goes without saying that it was nice to see a duel like this go down between guys of this caliber. It also goes without saying that you should never mess around with Pusha T.
