Kendrick Lamar references Drake beef during halftime show at Super Bowl 2025

The Kendrick Lamar-Drake beef has hit the Super Bowl.

Lamar performed a segment of his diss track "Not Like Us" during his halftime show performance at Super Bowl LIX on Sunday. After several intentional false starts teasing that the song was about to begin, Lamar finally launched into the track, which has become his biggest hit to date.

The rapper made sure to include some of the most scathing lines that directly address his Torontonian rival, including "Say, Drake, I hear you like 'em young" and "tryna strike a chord, and it's probably A minor," the latter of which the crowd resoundingly shouted at the Caesars Superdome.

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Lamar did pull one punch, possibly because of FCC regulations: He didn't explicitly call Drake a pedophile, as he does in the recording and other live performances of the song. Instead, he rapped, "Certified Lover Boy? Certified—" and cut himself off with a pre-recorded scream sound effect just before the accusation.

Perhaps the most devastating moment in the performance came when a very recognizable surprise guest appeared: Serena Williams, who was rumored to have dated Drake in the mid-2010s, took the stage to dance in the middle of "Not Like Us." (Drake previously said that he wrote the 2016 song "Like That" about the tennis star.)

The feud between the two rappers dates back to October 2023, when Drake and J. Cole released their song "First Person Shooter." During the song, Cole referred to himself, Drake, and Lamar as "the Big Three" of contemporary hip-hop.

Lamar remained silent on the matter until March 2024, when he supplied a guest verse on "Like That" by Future and Metro Boomin. "Motherf--- the big three, n---a, it's just me," he rapped on the song.

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J. Cole was the first to fire back at Lamar with his song "7 Minute Drill," but he quickly apologized to the rapper and called his own song "the lamest s--- I ever did in my f---ing life."

On April 19, Drake released "Push Ups," where he clapped back at Lamar's diss by mocking his collaborations with pop artists like Maroon 5 and Taylor Swift. The same day, he also released "Taylor Made Freestyle" on the same day as "Push Ups," which inexplicably used AI recreations of Tupac Shakur and Snoop Dogg.

Lamar hit back with "Euphoria" on April 30, pulling absolutely no punches with lyrics like "I hate the way that you walk, the way that you talk, I hate the way that you dress" and "I like Drake with the melodies, I don't like Drake when he act tough."

Without a response, Lamar released "6:16 in LA" three days later, insinuating that Drake's inner circle is secretly working against the "Nice for What" musician. That same day, Drake released "Family Matters," accusing Lamar of physically abusing his own fiancée, Whitney Alford, and claiming that her child with Lamar was actually fathered by their friend-slash-bodyguard Dave Free. Lamar took only 20 minutes to release his response, "Meet the Grahams," which takes aim at Drake's family and accuses him of having multiple secret children (and apologizes to the kids on their dad's behalf).

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The apex of the beef came the next day, May 4, when Lamar dropped "Not Like Us." The song, which accuses Drake of pedophilia and calls him a colonizer, quickly became a massive hit and shattered rap streaming records. The song won five Grammys earlier this month, including Record of the Year and Song of the Year — and although Drake released a response song ("The Heart Part 6"), he eventually deleted the Instagram post promoting the track, all but ensuring that the majority of listeners see Lamar as the undeniable victor of the feud.

Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly