The Drake–Kanye West feud is an ongoing and highly publicized feud, or informally a "beef", between American rapper Kanye West and Canadian rapper Drake. The conflict has unfolded over several years and has involved public statements, social media exchanges, and musical releases.[1]
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2009–2016: Background
West and Drake had a fair share of interactions before their disputes. West directed the music video for "Best I Ever Had," Drake's 2009 debut single.[2] West also featured in Drake's 2009 single "Forever" alongside Eminem and Lil Wayne.[3] Furthermore, West also wrote for and produced Drake's 2010 single "Find Your Love," alongside Jeff Bhasker, No I.D. and Drake himself. During an interview with The Source Drake revealed he wanted to be better than West and surpass him one day.[4] In May 2011 Drake rapped in the song "I'm on One", "I'm just feeling like the throne is for the taking (watch me take it)",[5] referencing Kanye's joint album with Jay-Z Watch the Throne that dropped in August 2011.[6] In 2015, Drake and West were still on good terms as both of them featured in Big Sean's "Blessings".
2018: Escalation
Pusha T and Drake beef, West involvement
Drake and rapper Pusha T had been on bad terms from 2011 until that point.[7] Tensions rose between the two after Pusha T released his album Daytona, which was produced by West.[8] On the album's last track, "Infrared", Pusha T questioned Drake's lyrical abilities, suggesting Quentin Miller had been writing for Drake behind the scenes.[9] Drake responded with "Duppy Freestyle" calling West a "leech and serpent" for resenting his former collaborator Virgil Abloh, as he left West's company Yeezy to become creative director of Louis Vuitton.[10] He also questioned the extravagance of Pusha-T and his brother Malice's drug dealing background. Drake ended the song by denying the ghostwriting allegations brought up by Meek Mill in their 2015 rap beef, and name dropping the wife of Pusha T.[11]
Four days after the release of "Duppy Freestyle", Pusha T released "The Story of Adidon" over the instrumental to Jay-Z's "The Story of O.J.", mocking Drake's alleged insecurities about his race, the relationship between Drake's mother and father, Drake's longtime producer Noah "40" Shebib having multiple sclerosis, and revealing that Drake has a son with French model and former porn star Sophie Brussaux. Pusha T also revealed the scrapped Adidas collaboration with Drake titled "Adidon" was named after Drake's son, Adonis.[12]
Drake appeared on the second episode of LeBron James' HBO show The Shop and implied that West scheduled the releases of Ye, Daytona, and other albums to interfere with the release of Scorpion and seemed to believe that West told Pusha T about his son.[13] Later however Pusha T came forward and claimed Drake's producer Noah "40" Shebib was the one who revealed to him that the rapper has a child.[14] West also apologized to Drake for dropping the albums around the same time as Scorpion claiming he had a lot going on at the time. He also denied telling Pusha T about his son.[15]
"Lift Yourself" beat
Drake revealed during his appearance on The Shop he was briefly invited to West's Wyoming sessions for the album that would become Ye, but instead of leaving with a collaboration, Drake revealed he loved the "Lift Yourself" beat, Drake also revealed later that he and West both had an agreement for Drake to buy the beat for $2,000,000. But instead of selling the beat, West kept it for himself and used phrases based around the words poop, scoop, and whoop. West's verse includes him saying, "Whoopdedy-scoop, whoopdedy-whoop-scoop-poop, poop, poop", and the song abruptly ends after the verse.[16]
In September 2018, West admitted Drake had some ill feelings towards him because he used the beat for "Lift Yourself" that Drake originally wanted.[17] West stated that he should have given Drake an opportunity before releasing the final version and also apologized to him over their falling out, which was led to by West's usage of the beat and his role in Pusha T's feud with Drake.[17]
"Sicko Mode"
Between 13 December and 14 December 2018, West sent out a series of tweets where he called out Drake for what he labeled "sneak disses" on Travis Scott's "Sicko Mode". He followed up and urged Scott to apologize. West alleged that Drake threatened his life and the safety of his family.[18]
The following day his then-wife Kim Kardashian defended West and told Drake to stop threatening her family.[19]
2021: Social media and album conflicts
On August 23, 2021, Drake reignited their feud by dissing West on the Trippie Redd song "Betrayal".[20] Later on that day, West shared what seemed to be Drake's Toronto address in an Instagram post he eventually deleted.[21] Drake referenced on the Certified Lover Boy track "7AM on Bridle Path".[22] Drake leaked Donda outtake "Life of the Party" featuring André 3000 during the Certified Lover Boy guest DJ mix on Sirius XM on 4 September 2021, where West originally dissed Drake by name.[23]
West and Drake released the albums Donda and Certified Lover Boy five days apart. Donda was released by West on 29 August 2021 and debuted at No. 1 on the US Billboard 200 selling 309,000 units in its first week. This was surpassed by Drake's Certified Lover Boy that released on 3 September 2021 and sold 613,000 units in its first week as well as replacing Donda as No. 1 as it dropped to second.[24]
2023–2024: Further exchanges
On April 7, 2023, Drake released "Search and Rescue" where Drake used an excerpt of a conversation between West's ex-wife Kim Kardashian and her mother Kris Jenner about Kim's divorce from West: "I didn't come this far, just to come this far and not be happy", Kardashian told her mother in a clip from an episode of their reality show Keeping Up with the Kardashians.[25]
On November 17, 2023, Drake released "Red Button" as part of For All the Dogs Scary Hours Edition. Drake called out West for being false when apologizing about their recurring conflict.[26]
On April 19, 2024, West previewed a remix of "Like That", which took aim at Drake and J. Cole, amidst the former's ongoing feud with Kendrick Lamar.[27]