I do think you’re glossing over a bit about the other aspect of the beef - the allegations that Drake is incredibly inauthentic culture vulture and why the critique is so damning.
Drake, in many ways, is one of the first true social media superstars. Like social media, Drake’s music is an amalgamation of different styles and tropes, sometimes cartoonishly so. The core of the critique is that not only is Drake not from the culture, but he inauthentically uses it at the expense of other artists. Kendrick has both the skill and talent to make such incisive critiques while also making a bop, something that Drake just isn’t skilled enough to do. And Kendrick’s music is the complete opposite of Drake and he is significantly less overexposed, making him the perfect avatar for the critique.
Most importantly, both Kendrick and Metro Boomin have made it cool for the masses to dislike Drake, something that would’ve been almost unthinkable six months ago .
broadly agree here, and I think Drake's decline in quality recently also plays a role in this.
The 'Drake is creepy around girls' stuff has been known for a while. But Drake was making nonstop hits, so people just didn't talk about it. Pusha humiliated him with 'Story of Adidon', but Drake's album dropped a month later and 'God's Plan', 'Nice for What' and 'In My Feelings' were all smash hits, all three hit #1 on the charts and went viral on youtube. So Drake's still winning, he's still in the culture.
But Drake's fallen off a bit. He's still getting chart hits just out of sheer inertia, but it feels like there's no energy around him anymore, people don't actually care like they cared about something like In My Feelings. And so when the time comes, people are willing to turn on him.
This. I think one of Drake's main mistakes here is that he misread the battlefield, so to speak. When he was battling Joe Budden, or Pusha, or Meek, he was going bar-for-bar (for the most part, some of the ones Budden sent directly at his face were crazy), but also he was winning the social media front of the war. He's been on top of the game...what, 14 years now? Something like that?
Fatigue may have set in for the average listener, and I don't think he was quite ready for how eager the public seems to be to turn the page on him, to some degree. I think Kendrick had the better songs, but I'm sure the thing that probably surprised Drake the most was just how eager the public was to dance and sing to punchlines about him liking young women.
Also, I think Drake fans (and Ak, and Mal) were mad about Kendrick not backing up any of his claims, but it's not like Drake had any receipts for his claims, either. The reason that the underage stuff stuck to him is because EVERYONE has seen those stories and videos and thought to themself, "Huh, that's weird. I, a grown adult, do not seem to be inclined to text with 14-year-olds and tell them I miss them, but this gentleman seems to be doing this more than once."
It doesn't even matter if the teens involved absolve him of any wrongdoing, because to a normal person, the fact that it even happened at all was weird enough.
Jcole with the 1000 iq dodge. BBL Drizzy BBL Drizzyyyyyy
This was a very fun high level read!
I do think you’re glossing over a bit about the other aspect of the beef - the allegations that Drake is incredibly inauthentic culture vulture and why the critique is so damning.
Drake, in many ways, is one of the first true social media superstars. Like social media, Drake’s music is an amalgamation of different styles and tropes, sometimes cartoonishly so. The core of the critique is that not only is Drake not from the culture, but he inauthentically uses it at the expense of other artists. Kendrick has both the skill and talent to make such incisive critiques while also making a bop, something that Drake just isn’t skilled enough to do. And Kendrick’s music is the complete opposite of Drake and he is significantly less overexposed, making him the perfect avatar for the critique.
Most importantly, both Kendrick and Metro Boomin have made it cool for the masses to dislike Drake, something that would’ve been almost unthinkable six months ago .
broadly agree here, and I think Drake's decline in quality recently also plays a role in this.
The 'Drake is creepy around girls' stuff has been known for a while. But Drake was making nonstop hits, so people just didn't talk about it. Pusha humiliated him with 'Story of Adidon', but Drake's album dropped a month later and 'God's Plan', 'Nice for What' and 'In My Feelings' were all smash hits, all three hit #1 on the charts and went viral on youtube. So Drake's still winning, he's still in the culture.
But Drake's fallen off a bit. He's still getting chart hits just out of sheer inertia, but it feels like there's no energy around him anymore, people don't actually care like they cared about something like In My Feelings. And so when the time comes, people are willing to turn on him.
This. I think one of Drake's main mistakes here is that he misread the battlefield, so to speak. When he was battling Joe Budden, or Pusha, or Meek, he was going bar-for-bar (for the most part, some of the ones Budden sent directly at his face were crazy), but also he was winning the social media front of the war. He's been on top of the game...what, 14 years now? Something like that?
Fatigue may have set in for the average listener, and I don't think he was quite ready for how eager the public seems to be to turn the page on him, to some degree. I think Kendrick had the better songs, but I'm sure the thing that probably surprised Drake the most was just how eager the public was to dance and sing to punchlines about him liking young women.
Also, I think Drake fans (and Ak, and Mal) were mad about Kendrick not backing up any of his claims, but it's not like Drake had any receipts for his claims, either. The reason that the underage stuff stuck to him is because EVERYONE has seen those stories and videos and thought to themself, "Huh, that's weird. I, a grown adult, do not seem to be inclined to text with 14-year-olds and tell them I miss them, but this gentleman seems to be doing this more than once."
It doesn't even matter if the teens involved absolve him of any wrongdoing, because to a normal person, the fact that it even happened at all was weird enough.
Drake: https://youtu.be/uxJyPsmEask?feature=shared