If you were already exhausted by the so-called “rap beef” (ugh) between J. Cole and Kendrick Lamar after the past week, don’t worrry; you’re in good company. J. Cole himself was apparently done before his diss song, “7 Minute Drill,” was a full 72 hours old. During his set at Dreamville Festival, he straight-up apologized to his good buddy Kendrick and called the track the “lamest sh*t” of his life.
For what it’s worth, his assessment probably came after seeing the less-than-lukewarm response the track received from rap fans online, who questioned his decision to call Kendrick’s Grammy-winning album To Pimp A Butterfly sleep-inducing after that’s been the primary argument against his music on Twitter since before everybody on there became a fake activist in 2014.
It’s also probable that J. Cole realized that he and Kendrick had no real prior animosity and he was just the victim of splash damage from Kendrick’s incisive call-out on Future & Metro Boomin’s “Like That.” Although Kendrick declared “motherf*ck the Big Three / It’s just big me” most of his shots were seemingly reserved for Drake, against whom he has been pitted by rap fans almost since their near-parallel ascensions from the blog era of the late aughties.
In any case, it appears that Cole didn’t really want smoke, was equally disappointed in his own conribution to the three-way feud, and has decided to let the two actual contenders duke it out without his input. If only he’d realized this BEFORE he dropped Might Delete Later, this whole mess could have been avoided.