After years of peace, Drake and Joe Budden are beefing again after the Toronto rapper responded, at length, to some of Budden's constructive criticism of his new album, For All The Dogs. Budden and Drake have sustained a comical and meme-heavy relationship since they met over-10 years ago, but now it seems like their dynamic has reached a boiling point.
On the latest episode of the Joe Budden Podcast, “8:45am in Fayetteville,” the former Slaughterhouse rapper talked about some of the problems he had with Drake’s latest album. His critiques mainly revolved around how he felt Drake should rap about more mature topics instead of catering to his younger fan base since he’s getting older.
“You are 36,” Budden says around the 56-minute mark. “Your birthday is in 20 days. I Googled that, too. You’re going to be 37 years old. Get the fuck away from some of these younger niggas. And stop fucking these 25-year-olds… I want to hear adult Drake rapping for adult people.”
Budden also spoke positively about the album, saying that he liked it overall despite being let down by certain aspects. Drake took particular notice of his criticism, though, and responded under a post from DJ Akademiks that featured a clip from the podcast airing Joe out.
"You have failed at music," Drake wrote in the comment. "You left it behind to do what you are doing in this clip cause this is what actually pays your bills. For any artist watching this just remember you are watching a failure give their opinion on his idea of a recipe for success.” He went on to say, “this is a man projecting his own self hate and the fact I did and continue to do everything he wanted to do for himself.” Budden responded to the comment saying, “You'll grow up sooner or later... Father time is undefeated."
Drake proceeded to send subliminal shots at Budden, his career, and his podcast co-host Parks Vallely, on Instagram the following day between tour stops. Their relationship hasn’t always been like this. Throughout the back-and-forth, videos surfaced of Drake singing Joe's praises in 2009, and people like Apple Music’s Ebro Darden have chimed in on their thoughts on Drake’s maturity level. Unfortunately, this recent incident seems to have revived the feud between the two rappers.
Here is a timeline of Joe Budden and Drake’s complicated relationship.
May 2016: Joe Shares His Opinion on Views
![Drake and Budden’s complicated relationship unsurprisingly started with the former rapper sharing his opinion on Drizzy’s music. During the early days of his podcast, when it was called I’ll Name This Podcast Later, Budden spoke at length about how he disliked the rapper’s fourth studio album, Views. "I think that that kid on that album that I heard sounds real fucking uninspired,” he said at the time. “That music sounds good, and I enjoy it. “Noah] 40 [Shebib], you sound amazing. 40 continues to progress; Drake, you do not." During his rant, he also played the audio of his encounter with a young Drake in 2009 that has now resurfaced.](https://img.youtube.com/vi/S8sc5OH3Mdk/mqdefault.jpg)
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Drake and Budden’s complicated relationship unsurprisingly started with the former rapper sharing his opinion on Drizzy’s music. During the early days of his podcast, when it was called I’ll Name This Podcast Later, Budden spoke at length about how he disliked the rapper’s fourth studio album, Views. "I think that that kid on that album that I heard sounds real fucking uninspired,” he said at the time. “That music sounds good, and I enjoy it. “Noah] 40 [Shebib], you sound amazing. 40 continues to progress; Drake, you do not." During his rant, he also played the audio of his encounter with a young Drake in 2009 that has now resurfaced.
June 2016: Budden weighs in on “4pm in Calabasas”
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Shortly after Joe shared his thoughts on Views, Drake dropped his timestamp song “4pm in Calabasas” where he sends subliminal shots at several artists, including Chris Brown, Diddy, and Budden. Budden dedicated an over 20-minute segment of his following podcast episode to breaking down all of the different lines in the song that he thinks could be referring to him in a truly hilarious segment because of how serious he was. Throughout his analysis, Budden affirms that he’s a Drake fan despite his criticisms.
July 2016: Budden fires back with consecutive diss tracks
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A few weeks after Drake dropped “4pm in Calabasas,” Budden comes out of his brief rap retirement and disses Drake back on his song “Making a Murderer, Pt.1.” On the track, Budden spends four verses dismantling Drake’s persona, opening with a soundbite from their encounter in 2009, and rapping about his ghostwriting allegations and how he believes Drizzy to be fake. He followed that with another diss track, “Afraid,” where he sampled Drake’s song “The Resistance.”
July 2016: Drake responds on “No Shopping”
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As their war of words continued in summer of 2016, Drake took more direct aim at Budden during his verse on French Montana’s song “No Shopping.” “Pump, pump, pump it up/She got a good head on her, but I pump it up/I'm not a one hit wonder, they know all my stuff/You let me turn into the nigga that you almost was,” he raps, referencing Budden’s hit song “Pump It Up." Shortly after this, Drake also addresses Budden by name during the Dallas stop of his Summer Sixteen tour. “We got that good energy going on,” He says. “I should’ve brought Joe Budden up here and let him do ‘Pump It Up’ one time.”
July 2016: Drake fans pull up to Budden’s house
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That same month, three Drake fans found Joe Budden's address and recorded themselves trolling him as he was leaving his home. This prompted Budden to chase the stans down the block, on foot, before catching them in his car and warning them never to try something like that again. “This is not the internet,” he warned them. “I will kill one of you.” The fateful incident would become a meme to this day.
April 2020: The beef is squashed on Instagram Live
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After years of back and forth and subtle jabs, Joe Budden and Drake finally squashed their beef on Instagram Live. “We have an interview to do when the album’s ready,” Drake said, referring to Certified Lover Boy. That interview never happened, but the two continued to joke around with each other on Live which solidified the end of their contentious relationship to the public, or so it seemed.
July 2022: Drake trolls Budden while on vacation
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This was a light-hearted moment, but while on vacation following the release of Honestly, Nevermind, Drake trolled Budden by recording a video of his hit song “Pump It Up” being played at a restaurant where he was. “Where else Joey,” Drake says sarcastically in the Instagram story. “Where else would you have them going so crazy.”
