Kendrick Lamar headlined a “Pop Out” concert on Wednesday, June 20 where his recent string of diss tracks against Drake were front and center. The 37-year-old rapper performed his viral hit “Not Like Us” five times in a row to close out the set, and once again took over social media. Fans thought that this beef was over, but now they’re wondering if Drake will make some kind of response.
Lamar marked Juneteenth with a massive show at The Forum in Los Angeles, California, inviting other artists from the city to perform and commanding the stage for about 90 minutes himself. The whole event streamed live via Amazon, and is still circulating online at the time of this writing. Lamar reunited with some old collaborators, graciously platformed younger artists while showing deference to those who came before him, and of course, he played some of the biggest hits from his career. However, he opened and closed the set with his recent Drake diss tracks, and they arguably were the strongest through-line of the setlist.
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Drake opened with “Euphoria,” with some changes to the lyrics to emphasize the celebration of west coast hip hop culture. He played seven more conventional songs before playing the diss track “6:16 in LA,” this time featuring rapper Ab-Soul, then five songs layer he played “Like That” – the last song in this exchange that wasn’t an outright diss track. Of course, the main event was the closer. Drake played two songs with Dr. Dre, who hung around on stage to introduce the first round of “Not Like Us.” Dre himself whispered the introductory line: “I see dead people.”
Lamar cut the song short only to start it over, end it early again, and start it a third time run it all the way through. After that, Lamar ended his set, but returned to cheers for an encore to play “Not Like Us” once again – this time with producer Mustard on stage as well. Finally, Lamar finished the night with a fifth round of “Not Like Us,” joined on stage by some of the biggest acts that had come out to perform with him, including Mustard and his old group Black Hippy.
Just as many famous names were in the audience, according to The Associated Press. The Weeknd, LeBron James, Ayo Edebiri and Rick Ross were all in attendance. Lamar left no doubt that this was a show of solidarity, in some ways, calling for a group photo on stage by saying: “Let the world see. For all of us to be on this stage together, unity, from East side… L.A., Crips, Bloods, Piru – this… is special, man. We put this… together just for y’all. This ain’t got nothing to do with no song at this point, ain’t got nothing to do with no back and forth records, it’s got everything to do with this moment right here. That’s what this… was about, to bring all of us together.”
Fans are in awe of this coordinated performance, and many heads are spinning as they try to predict what could come next. Some suspect a response from Drake is imminent – be it another diss track, a similar event or simply a shady social media post. So far, the rapper has not made any public reaction.
