The Hip Hop world has been in a frenzy over the recent Drake and Kendrick Lamar beef disses. We are not here to summarize the beef or break down the meaning of lyrics, you can find that detail on any other blog. We are here to discuss the results of the diss songs in the aftermath of the beef, as far as music analytics are concerned.
Here is a Timeline of the diss tracks:
Metro Boomin & Future – Like That (Kendrick Feature), 3/26
Drake – Push Ups, 4/19
Drake – Taylor Made Freestyle, 4/19
Kendrick Lamar – euphoria, 4/30
Kendrick Lamar – 6:16 in LA, 5/3
Drake – Family Matters, 5/3
Kendrick Lamar – Meet the Grahams, 5/3
Kendrick Lamar – Not Like Us, 5/4
Drake – The Heart Part 6, 5/5
Since the diss tracks have been released, Kendrick Lamar has claimed top charting positions for his West coast style bop/diss track, “Not Like Us”, as well as “euphoria”, and “meet the grahams”, which are #1, #2, and #3 on iTunes in Hip Hop, and #1 (“Not Like Us”) and #3 (“euphoria”) on Apple Music All Genres as of the writing of this article. Drake is #4 on Apple Music and #6 on iTunes, with “Family Matters”.
Kendrick’s “euphoria” has also gained a chart position on Billboard’s Hot 100, at #11:
Irrespective of the fact that both artist diss tracks contain non-factual information about the other (which is a whole article in itself), the songs are definitely being streamed and undeniably popular, dictating Hip Hop music right now.
What the Stats Show
Now, let’s dive a little deeper into the artist stats. Normally we would do this for just the songs, but in light of the popularity of this rap beef, and the number of songs it produced, we wanted to focus on the artist stats to find out how this has impacted them career-wise, as the superstars that they both are.
According to our Chartmetric analysis, there is definitely a “fan exploration” effect going on. From our analysis, Drake fans are not jumping ship from Drake, despite popular public opinion. But, they are definitely listening to Kendrick right now, so are fans of other hip hop artists, such as J. Cole. Not surprisingly, most J. Cole fans are also Kendrick Lamar fans, as they share a heavy fanbase together.
So, what we have is a very strong solid base of Drake/J. Cole fans going over to listen to Kendrick Lamar’s diss tracks, as well as to songs from Kendrick’s old albums, for clues about his lyrics. Drake fans definitely want to hear about Drake. They are listening to Kendrick disses over and over, most likely trying to dissect his lyrics. So are fans of J. Cole, as well as other popular hip hop artists. It is evident from the stats. See below where Kendrick and Drake are both seeing an increase in overall numbers:
Kendrick Lamar –
Drake –
However, Kendrick’s fanbase is surprisingly not increasing by much. He has a slight gain in followers, but only a fan 43.5% conversion rate. This means that just 43.5% of his music listeners are converting into fans and following him. This is significant for Spotify, as it is a clutch streaming platform for notifying fans of an artist’s concerts, new merch, and new releases.
It appears that Drake’s fans are driving Kendrick’s numbers right now, not Kendrick fans. Drake fans are staying with Drake (not unfollowing), still listening to him but just not quite as much, while they also listening to Kendrick Lamar (while not following Kendrick). This is apparent in Drake’s steady numbers:
Drake has an unsurprising decrease in listeners right now. They are not listening to him as much, as they continue to dissect the diss lyrics. That is a likely outcome.
Top Diss Tracks in this Beef
The answer that everyone wants to know…
But also the answer that anyone that has been following the diss tracks already knows.
Kendrick Lamar’s “euphoria” is the most popular diss track between the two artists, and the most popular of his, with a 91 popularity score. It has had over 1,100 reported radio airplay spins.
Drake’s “Family Matters” was his most popular diss, coming in 2nd, with a popularity score of 83. It has had 286 reported radio airplay spins.
Surprisingly, it was not as close as we thought it would be.
Despite the fun in the competitiveness of this rap beef, there has been a serious overtone. On May 7th, an OVO store in London was vandalized, with the words, “Not Like Us”, written in graffiti on the store window.
After that, a shooter appeared outside of Drake’s home in Toronto, Canada and opened fire, in what has been described as a “drive by” type of shooting. A member of his security team was left in serious condition, according to TMZ.
So in addition to providing these music stats for your reading pleasure, we ask that the violence stop, and for our readers to not engage in behaviors that could trigger violence when discussing the beefs, when at all possible.
We cherish these beloved superstars and do not want a repeat of what happened to the late Notorious B.I.G. and 2Pac.
Thank you for reading.
Check out and follow our Hip Hop Heads Def On Repeat playlist, which features “euphoria”:
Check out and follow our All Drake playlist, featuring “Push Ups” and “Family Matters”:
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