J Cole confirms he dissed Kanye West on Ye’s own song
J Cole and Kanye West have had a rocky relationship over the years, despite the Dreamville rapper openly calling him an inspiration. On the latest episode of his Inevitable audio series, Cole has revealed he took jabs at Ye with his feature on ‘Looking for Trouble’ as part of the G.O.O.D. Fridays series in 2010.
The reason for his shots traces back to a UStream that West hosted prior to the release of My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. When a fan asked if he planned to work with J Cole, his answer wasn’t the most convincing.
“He said, ‘I mean, we might put him on one of the G.O.O.D. Fridays or something,’” Cole recalled. “It was like a, ‘Yes, but he’s not a n*gga that I would [feature on my album]. If he would’ve been like, ‘Yeah, it would be fire to put him on a G.O.O.D. Friday [song],’ it would have been a different feeling. Kanye’s answer was, like — I don’t think anybody watching it would notice, but me being me, I looked at him like, ‘Aw, that shit was hella dismissive.'”
J Cole’s shots came in the first few lines of his verse, claiming Kanye “downplayed” him, with his lyrical ability causing elder rappers to keep an eye over their shoulder. He raps, “Cole World, make way for the chosen one/ What you now hear is puttin’ fear in all the older ones/ Downplayed me to downgrade me like they don’t notice him/ Your shoes too big to fill? I can barely squeeze my toes in ‘em.’”
At first, Cole turned down the opportunity to be on ‘Looking for Trouble’ due to the fact he was touring at the time. “I’m genuinely like, ‘Damn, bro, I appreciate it. But yo, I’m on this tour. I can’t. I’m in fucking Michigan and I’m not gonna be able to make it,’” he said. “Mind you, it was due Friday and this is Wednesday afternoon.”
He added, “[Kanye] was like, ‘I asked such and such and they make it happen.’ It was a polite flex of like, ‘I think you can make this happen.’ It made me be like, ‘Alright, yeah, how can I make it happen?’”
This isn’t the only time J Cole has taken shots at West, of course. In 2016, Cole subliminally dissed Kanye in the first verse of ‘False Prophets’, rapping, “There was a time when this n*gga was my hero, maybe/ That’s the reason why his fall from grace is hard to take.”