Why Kendrick Lamar Shaded J.Cole & Drake in 'Like That'

Kendrick Lamar didn’t hold back in his newest collaborative single that was included on fellow rapper Future and mega-producer Metro Boomin’s latest joint album, WE DON’T TRUST YOU. The 5’6 award-winning rapper’s verse on Future and Metro Boomin’s newest song Like That had a shady undertone that some hip-hop fans can’t help but point out.

On Friday, quickly after the album, WE DON’T TRUST YOU dropped on Thursday (March 21), the internet exploded into a frenzy over Lamar seemingly firing shots at his rivals through his Like That lyrics. Although the well-respected West Coast rapper didn’t name-drop, unveiling who he was coming at directly, many assume that the unmentioned hip-hop artists he was targeting were Drake and J. Cole.

“Ooohhhhh God Kendrick Lamar Just Started The Fireworks. That Diss To Drake And Cole On Like That, Off Metro And Future New Album. Drake My Goat And Cole. You Have 24 Hours To Respond…” one person wrote on X, fka Twitter.

Another X user admitted: “I like Kendrick Lamar, but I don’t like that he dissed J. Cole. Just diss Drake, and leave Cole out of it…”

Amid the plethora of people convinced that K. Dot was passive-aggressively attacking Moe Dee and Champagne Papi, some on X weren’t too sure.

“Did Kendrick Lamar diss Drake on like that ? Lol. That’s wild,” one questioned.

“F**k sneak dissin’/ first person shooter/I hope they came with three switches
I crash out, like/ ‘F**k rap,’ diss Melle Mel if I had to,” Kendrick spat in his verse, referencing Drake and Cole’s 2023 collab record First Person Shooter. In First Person Shooter, Cole referenced Lamar, rapping: “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, but right now/ I feel like Muhammad Ali.”

Lamar’s guest spot on Like That appeared further to deconstruct Cole’s bars on First Person Shooter, seemingly slamming it with his mini-rant: “Big As the What duo/Think I won’t drop the location?/ I still got PTSD/ Motherf–k the Big 3, n-word, it’s just big me.” Lamar also seemed to snap at Drake, rapping, “‘Fore all your dogs gettin’ buried, that’s a K with all these nines, he gon’ see Pet Sematary.”

Here’s some background for context. First Person Shooter is a song from Drake’s 2023 album For All The Dogs, and this year he and Cole are heading on the road together for their It’s All a Blur Tour — Big As The What tour. Their tour title was derived from their aforementioned collab single.

“I know good and well that Kendrick’s not murdering me, at all, in any platform”
Drake

For a brief moment in time, Drake and Lamar were on better terms. Turn back time to 2011, and you’d witness an in-his-prime Drake reaching back to give a helping hand to an up-and-coming Lamar prior to the latter signing his record deal.

Drake invited then-independent rapper Kendrick on his 2011 sophomore album Take Care, allowing him to shine on the album’s interlude record, Buried Alive. In 2012, The Degrassi: Next Generation alum brought Lamar along with him, in addition to rapper A$AP Rocky, on the Club Paradise Tour to promote the Take Care album.

That same year, Lamar signed with Dr. Dre’s iconic record label Aftermath—home to legendary rappers Eminem and 50 Cent—and dropped his iconic debut record, Good Kid, M.A.A.D. City, which included a Drake feature. Drake contributed a verse on Lamar’s chart-topping song Poetic Justice, a breakout hit from his first major-label album.

Shortly after that, A$AP Rocky had both Drake and Lamar on his 2013 hit single F**kin’ Problems along with rapper 2 Chainz. All seemed to be well between Drake and Lamar until Lamar decided to toot his own horn a little too loudly for Drake.

In a verse that Lamar rapped on Big Sean’s 2013 song Control he said: “I’m usually homeboys with the same n-words I’m rhyming with/ But this is hip-hop And them n-words should know what time it is/And that goes for Jermaine Cole, Big K.R.I.T., Wale Pusha T, Meek Millz, ASAP Rocky, Drake
Big Sean, Jay Electron’, Tyler, Mac Miller/ I got love for you all, but I’m tryna murder you n-words/Tryna make sure your core fans never heard of you n-words/ They don’t wanna hear not one more noun or verb from you n-words.”

Drake addressed Lamar head-on in a Billboard interview in the summer of 2013. During the interview, Billboard asked him what he thought of Lamar’s Control verse.

“It just sounded like an ambitious thought to me. That’s all it was. I know good and well that Kendrick’s not murdering me, at all, in any platform. So when that day presents itself, I guess we can revisit the topic,” the actor-turned-rapper told the news publication.

Until Drake dropped his 2013 album Nothing Was the Same, it seemed as if the A-list celebrity was unphased by Lamar. However, a song on that project titled The Language expressed something different. “I don’t know why they have been lyin’/ But your shit is not that inspirin’,” Drake rapped in The Language, seemingly articulating his brewing animosity toward Lamar, albeit not addressing him directly. For the rest of 2013, the two appeared to be at odds.

“Yea, and nothing’s been the samce since they dropped Control”
Kendrick Lamar

At the 2013 BET Awards, Lamar picked at Drake during one of the show’s cyphers, indirectly. He rapped in the cypher: “Yeah, and nothing’s been the same since they dropped Control/And tucked a sensitive rapper back in his pajama clothes.”

Near the end of 2013, the God’s Plan rapper tried to extend an olive branch to Lamar by going on the record to compliment the B**ch Don’t Kill My Vibe spitter. Drake told Vibe in 2013 that he “never once said that he ‘didn’t like’ [Lamar] or that [Lamar] was a ‘bad guy.'” He added that he thought Lamar was a “genius in his own f**king right.”

Drake admitted, however, that he did feel Lamar was trying to “bait” him into a rap beef, but he refused to fall for it. “I’m not gonna give you the chance to shake me necessarily, ’cause I feel great. There’s no real issue,'” Drake told the news outlet, referring to Lamar.

In 2014, Drake attempted to squash the budding friction between him and Lamar at his OVO Fest. “Shout out my n-word, Kendrick Lamar,” Drake said at his festival concert. “Kendrick was on my album, we went on tour…that’s one of the hardest n-words alive. He should be standing right [here]. There’s a lot of kings in this s**t, so shoutout to Kendrick and shoutout my brother J. Cole.”

Drake’s praise didn’t move Kendrick from his stance one bit, seeing that in late 2014, Lamar dropped a verse on TDE rapper Jay Rock’s single Pay For It, where he appeared to have mocked Drake for being a “motor mouth,” implying he talked too much.

Lamar said in his Pay For It verse: “I tell ’em all to hail King Kendrick/resurrecting my vengeance
Been dissecting your motor mouth till I break down the engine/This ain’t no warning shot, this a relevant henchman/ See my opponent then, cease your existence/Endin’ our friendship, baby, I’d rather die alone.”

Drake seemingly tried to minimize Lamar’s verse in the song Used To from his 2015 album If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late, rapping: “They gon’ say your name on them airwaves/They gon’ hit you up right after like it’s only rap.”

Lamar retaliated against Drake’s implication in Used To in his song King Kunta from his 2015 album To Pimp a Butterfly. He seemingly suggested that Drake used ghostwriters. At the time, rapper Quentin Miller was rumored to be the ghostwriter behind If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late. While Miller denied that he was Drake’s ghostwriter, he did admit to co-writing a few songs with Drake for the album. Drake didn’t seem to sweat the lyrical jab that Lamar threw at him since he used his words to launch a gut punch right into Lamar’s ego.

“I would have all of your fans / If I didn’t go pop and I stayed on some conscious s**t”
Drake

In his verse on The Game’s 2015 song 100, Drake boasted, “I would have all of your fans / If I didn’t go pop and I stayed on some conscious s**t,” possibly suggesting that Lamar wouldn’t be famous if he remained in the same space as Lamar lyrically. Shortly after that, Drake had more shade hurled at him at the hands of Lamar on Dr Dre’s 2015 album, Compton, which featured fellow Compton native Lamar. Lamar seemingly took a dig at Mr. OVO on both Darkside/Gone and Deep Water.

In 2016, Drake took credit for Lamar’s success again, reminding him and fans where Lamar got his start on the song 4 PM in Calabasas. Drake touted in the record: “When they told me take an R&B n-words on the road and I told ’em no and drew for Kendrick and Rocky / I tried to make the right choices with the world watching,” referencing when he brought Lamar and Rocky on the Club Paradise Tour in 2011.

The unsaid, but apparent, feud between Lamar and Drake continued in 2017 when Lamar dropped The Heart Part 4, which came out a month before Lamar’s Pulitzer-winning album DAMN. On The Heart Part 4, Lamar deflated Drake’s haughtiness with a verse that seemed to be geared toward him: “Jay-Z Hall of Fame, sit your punk a** down / So that means you ain’t bigger than rapping.”

“Jay-Z Hall of Fame, sit your punk a** down / So that means you ain’t bigger than rapping.”
Kendrick Lamar

After that, it went quiet between the two. Either because Lamar decided to take a break from hip-hop, he didn’t release another album until 2022 when he dropped Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers, or it just organically fizzled out. Drake and Cole’s collective song First Person Shooter has appeared to reactivate Lamar and Drake’s hip-hop war, which now has integrated Cole.

Whether or not Lamar is truly at odds with Cole is uncertain. There is some speculation that Lamar only took a shady shot at Cole in Like That because Cole dubbed himself the “Muhammad Ali of rap” in First Person Shooter, effectively calling himself the greatest rapper of all time. Although Lamar could take offense to that, that would be hypocritical of him since he, too, elevated himself above his competition in Control.

This means there could be underlying tension between Cole and Lamar that might’ve started when Cole decided to do a song and go on tour with his friend’s arch-nemesis. Lamar and Cole have been friends for years, so Lamar feeling betrayed by Cole wouldn’t be far-fetched. Especially since they collaborated in 2015, the same year Drake and Lamar were going head-to-head, for the record, Black Friday. On Black Friday, Lamar remixed Cole’s A Tale of 2 Citiez from Cole’s album 2014 Forest Hills Drive, and Cole remixed Lamar’s Alright from Lamar’s album To Pimp a Butterfly.