Without a doubt, Kanye West, also known as Ye, has made headlines all throughout the push of his 10th studio album “DONDA” with the symbolic references from his listening parties, but also, and more importantly, with the well-established beef between him and Drake. Drake and Ye have had a small-scale feud packed with tension over the past couple of years, which stemmed from Ye’s song called “Lift Yourself.” From this, Ye was dubbed “The King of Trolling” because he pushed lyrics like, “poopity scoop” and similar wordplay for his lyrics. To many viewers, this may seem confusing at first, but let’s take a deeper look into why this caused a falling out between the two.
When Ye released the song “Lift Yourself,” it was supposed to be a song with horrendous lyrics to illustrate his mental breakdowns with a sound sample of the 1973 soul song “Liberty” by the group Amnesty. On the other hand, this song was also sought by Drake who wanted either a feature on the song or to have it used for his “Scorpion” album. However, once Ye released the song, Drake then texted him purple demon emojis illustrating his anger.
From then on, Ye and Drake had an odd relationship and it didn’t help that Pusha-T, another hip-hop legend who had bad ties with Drake since 2011, was constantly working with Ye as he produced a good amount of his songs. Drake, of course, had some resentment for Ye and it was only fueled by his professional ties with Pusha-T.
That wasn’t the climax of their dying relationship, however. In 2018, Pusha-T and Drake were involved in a huge feud online and Drake’s son’s identity was leaked on the internet. Fans thought that Pusha-T released this information. However, Drake blamed Ye, because he believed that he leaked the information since he was closer to Drake and also had a reason to expose the artist, especially since he worked closely with Pusha-T. This is when Pusha-T’s releases the song “The Story of Adidon,” which might be a play on the name of Drake’s son, Adonis. This shocked the world even further with the cover art showing Drake in Black face.
For this, Drake was buried in backlash, and since then he has turned off comments to thousands of fans on his Instagram. From that monumental moment, you’d think the beef between them all would be over, but no, it continues.
In 2021, Drake was featured in a song with Trippie Redd in which he stated the following lyrics:
“All these fools I’m beefin’ that I barely know / Forty-five, forty-four (Burned out), let it go / Ye ain’t changin’ s*** for me, it’s set in stone.”
From there, Ye immediately understood the reference and took his feelings towards Drake to Instagram by adding him to an iMessage group chat which appeared to have Pusha-T in it as well.
Now the petty beef between Ye and Drake continues over both their albums being released in close proximity to one another this year, stemming from June all the way up until September. Both, throwing subtle disses at each other. Then, fans continued the conflict by debating which one is better, even more so with TheShaeRoom posting an Instagram poll discussing which one their fans would listen to first.
Now, in an attempt to have the artists come to a solution to the struggles of their friendship, Jr Prince posted a video on Instagram surprisingly asking Drake for a ceasefire and to help him use his platform to free Hoover, an individual Ye has been advocating to release from prison. Ye, along with Larry Hoover Jr, and Jr Prince has put together a “Free Larry Hoover” concert over the past few months, and since the Ye vs. Drake headlines became so prevalent, it’d only make sense to use each other’s platforms for the greater good. That being said, that’s exactly what Jr Prince was asking for with his post.
Fast forward to today, it appears Drake and Ye have squashed their beef and are set to perform together in Los Angeles for the Free Larry Hoover concert. The abrupt end in their squabble leaves some confusion for fans, but nonetheless, the overall view of the concert is set to be amazing and monumental for the industry, especially both artists and the future of the Hip Hop industry for years to come.
