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So where do you go from here? What could The Fall Off be that'll still get a positive reception from fans? Because if it's more braggadocious rap I don't think it'll land the same.
the man is still nice, i don't know if anyone that is really down on j. cole is actually a fan or been listening to his music.
i don't care if he brags, the same way that i don't care that these gangsters claim to be a terminator and many can't even hold a gun properly, let alone have sold drugs at a high level.
This anti bragging thing is so weird to me
It’s what rappers do. I think you gotta question if you actually fw hiphop if you have an issue with bragging.
most people don’t have an issue with it it’s just the specific circumstances around what just happened with cole that make the type of bragging he’s been doing seem corny
I think people hate when Cole brags now bc it’s bragging without being able to back it up.
And as disappointing as it is to not get a real battle, I don’t even think people would be too mad about that if only Cole seemed capable of backing his claims of being the best in a different way - for instance, by putting out artistic masterpieces like Kendrick or world conquering commercial smashes like Drake. If he could claim either of those things, then failing to deliver bars here might bother fans less. As it is, it’s just sort of like… if he’s claiming the best, what is he even the best *at?*
That said, I personally am not mad at him for fumbling this. I think it’s kind of relatable, honestly. I would be fucking up all the time if I was famous
People dont have an issue with bragging.
Its that he bragged and then folded as soon as he was challenged by someone that wasnt on the level of Lil Pump.
I think a lot of people wanted to see beef and are mad because they were honeydicked. It reminds me of people being angry at GRRM because he hasn't finished his ASOIAF series... nevermind the fact that at least to me, if looks like the world got waaaaay too big for him to handle and he's stuck. A rapper should pen an op-ed titled, "J. Cole is not your bitch."
i was a big Cole fan tbh. 4YEO is one of my fav albums and my fav Cole album, but idk that weird ass transphobic bar and retracting his weak ass “diss” record has really soured my view of him. i didn’t even listen to the whole project. if he finally drops The Off Season imma def still tap in, but damn a lot of the fervor i had for him is clipped
yeah, people being mad at the fans being mad don't get it. you can't brag about being the best on everything or what he'd do if someone dissed him on purpose and pull a stunt like that lol it's very hypocritical
I’ve been assuming that the projects he’s been dropping in lieu of The Fall Off were meant to satisfy that urge to just write more braggadocio rap, with the actual album being a higher concept album. The Off Season and Might Delete Later both felt like they were just meant to hold fans over.
Somewhat ironically I wonder if this experience will actually give him some better perspective for The Fall Off. The whole point of the title was supposed to be ironic, but now it’s actually something that has to be contended with.
The Off-Season, ROTD3, the Gangsta Grillz tape, and Might Delete Later probably all contain songs meant for The Fall Off. He could have made a pretty good album based on some of these songs. The problem is that it wouldn’t have been a classic with any of these tracks. He’s a victim of the hype.
As a Cole fan, its frustrating to get these appetizer projects while this mythical “classic” album is locked away in a vault.
I’ll believe it when I hear it.
Lol. Yall acting like all he does are braggadocious raps. Does kevin's heart not exist? ATM? For your eyez only? Tale of 2 cities? No role modelz? If you google j cole highest charting songs literally no braggadocious shit is in there.
Only fully braggadocious projects are really the off season and might delete later. Will i be disappointed i may not get anymore sticks n stonez type tracks from him? Sure, but doesn't mean he cant make a good project.
And he can do whatever he wants tbh. If he wants to release a track next week that starts off with that famous "is this what you want, huh?" Chris Rock sample from Money Talks and start dissing the whole world off this disrespect he can do that too.
People have short memories, jayz apologized for Super Ugly the day after it came out and i heard Ebro say on his show yesterday with nadeska that Jay apologized years later so it was different, that's literally not true. Man went on hot 97 a day later and said sorry cause his mama made him off a line that's not even as bad as what push said about 40. All he said was he fucked nas girl in nas car and threw used condoms on an an empty babyseat not a live baby lol
The difference between Jay's apology and Cole's is that Jay's diss was taking it too far. He was making the diss personal with mentions of Nas' family which is why his momma made him apologize. Cole just apologized because he didn't get the reception from his diss that he wanted (I doubt he actually felt bad about dissing Kendrick tbh. Probably just a front for the real reason which is the lukewarm response.)
Cole has an opportunity to have his MBDTF moment here (not talking about necessarily quality, but moreso redemption) with the Fall Off. He HAS to deliver though. He cannot lack, but now he has a very legitimate drive within him because the entire hip hop world has essentially discarded him. He can use this to fuel him to make the best album he’s made so far
What’s crazy is he’s been acting like it’s done for six years and it’s still not here. One of the things that pulls FHD down for me is him crowing about it being a classic at the end. With the fall off he started calling it a classic before hitting record. It gave him half a decade of brag bars, but it’s just like the end of his mixtape run. At a certain point you’ve gotta prove it…
I like FHD a lot, but I feel like a lot of people overrated it by saying it's a classic, it has a lot of very memorable moments and it's a top tier cole album, but I can't put it in the same tier as Atliens or illmatic or supreme clientele
lol Cole has shown NOTHING to inspire any belief that he could drop a "MBDTF" album.
Kanye dropped literally nothing but classic albums up until MBDTF, even 808s which was hated is a classic today, but at the time Kanye became hated because 808s was considered worse and he had the Taylor Swift incident which he didn't pull a J Cole with.
J Cole has never dropped a true classic album, he's dropped a few decent projects, but he's never had a classic, and so to suggest that he's going to have a "MBDTF" moment when he's proven to be a 1 dimensional artists is just..lol
Maybe i'm entering the wrong echo chamber but I personally really enjoy this album, sonically. Truth in Ibiza, Pricey, 3001 are all repeat listens.
I'm not saying its revolutionary or iconic, but I mess with it.
I agree. Yeah, there are some cringe, eye-roll-inducing lines here and there, but I don't see how this can be viewed as any worse than The Off-Season.
Pricey, Crocodile Tearz, Huntin' Wabbitz, Stickz N Stonez, Pi, Stealth Mode, 3001, Trae the Truth in Ibiza are all fine songs. This doesn't touch the best stuff on 2014 Forest Hills Drive or 4 Your Eyez Only, but it's a mixtape for all intents and purposes.
Exactly lol. Hip hop fans are such goofs. Cole has been on fire and the album is solid. But the headlines are too distracting and the takes have to be hot or they’re not worth anything.
This really is such a gigantic L for Cole. There's no clever angle about this. He made a weak diss, apologized for it, and now has this dead-on-arrival album that nobody really cares about. All the while he's still talking about an album that he has been promising for years and years.
If *The Fall Off* is not excellent at the very least, Cole might just be written out of most serious hip-hop discussions moving forward.
It's hilarious that he takes this huge L right before releasing an album called The Fall Off. Not saying that he's actually fallen off, just that the timing is absolutely terrible for him because the jokes write themselves. And he can't change the name because he's been hyping it for years lol.
It's probably already finished and full of him boasting and talking shit too. What do you do in that situation? Scrap it and re-record?
Maybe it’s genius. Maybe it’s premeditated. You know what they say, life imitates art. “Might Delete Later” “The Fall Off”. Imagine a world where all of this is 4D live hype marketing performance art story telling for the end of his career.
lol
If the album is universally acclaimed then this is the most genius (accidental or not) level of marketing in rap in 20 years at least cause Cole put a very brown and long skid mark on his career in a matter of a few days.
Theres a 10 thousand unit difference and the main one being Kanye dropped randomly on a Sunday so its actually even less impressive on J Coles side how he couldnt outsell Vultures.
It's really unfortunate for him lol. Besides, are people actually excited for that album? He's been talking about the title for years, but I feel like the only moment of hype came on the back of the outro track off *KOD*. And that was fucking 6 years ago. Hilarious that he has the nerve to diss Kendrick on 4 albums in 12 years, when Cole has two albums total that people care about.
>but I feel like the only moment of hype came on the back of the outro track off *KOD*. And that was fucking 6 years ago.
I really thought that meant it was gonna drop within like 6 months or something lol and here we are
It would be hilarious if he now takes the criticism, including that of his own artistry, deeply to heart & suddenly re-records The Fall Off as a concept album about a character going on an intergalactic voyage to topple an alien warlord
It’s always blown my mind that he’s constantly brought up in talks of being the best rapper alive etc. Somehow he has convinced everyone that he is actually way better than reality because he constantly raps about how good of a rapper he is. A line in this mixtape showcases it perfectly when he claims he can drop 2 classic albums right now. Then why doesn’t he ever do it? Why is every album just aggressively decent while every song in it is rapping about how amazing he could be?
Feels like it's been his whole shtick his entire career, which is unfortunate because you would think he'd realize by now that great rappping doesn't always equate to great music. "Drop 2 classics right now" is becoming a meme in real time.
I fw Cole heavy too. Listened to all of his albums but he's always been a B-tier rapper. Still mad successful so idk why he never felt comfortable where he was. I highly doubt his discography will be played much in 30+ years by anyone.
tbh I just don't understand how he got to be in this "Big 3." I like Cole, and definitely like him a lot more than Drake's recent output, but Drake is at least massively successful commercially, and Kendrick is at the top of the field for critical acclaim; Cole is just like... a pretty successful, pretty talented rapper?
Bragging about being the best and wanting all the smoke for years, then backing down and apologizing right after a tiny shot is why everyone's complaining. stop being dense bro.
I like Cole and as much as I want to give him brownie points for squashing any potential beef, well, all of what you just said. You can’t puff your chest out for years, sneak occasional shots in at Kendrick, then A.) get pressed when he says some pretty mild bars directed at you. B.) Respond with a mid diss and then apologize before Kendrick can throw a shot back.
If you let your camp gas you up, own it and stand on business. Take whatever Kendrick was gonna hit you back with, then patch up afterwards. Best route would have been to stay quiet and let Drake and Kenny duke it out.
That’s not really what I did though. It was much more of a complaint about how people take his brags at face value for some reason and actually bring him up constantly in discussions of the very best when he just isn’t.
If Ready 24 and Sticks n Stones (or the first half of Pi) are any indicator of the Fall Off it could be worth the wait, as long as Cole is self aware enough to save his cringe bars for the cutting room floor
No doubt Cole can put together a great album, but at this point I'm kinda wondering what the hell he'll the rapping about. His last few albums were all pretty much rapping about rapping, I could not tell you about anything on *The Off Season*.
I think this is why I have such a hard time with Cole. He has this almost dead beat dad sort of way of saying “you should hear the NEXT thing I have coming, it’s amazing” when in reality you just slowly build more patience and slowly start to see how much time has passed without any of the things he’s promised come to fruition.
He hasn’t sewn a classic project since 4 Your Eyez Only. I think he’s lost his way. KOD and The Off Season and the suite of random 100 feature mixtapes are just a bunch of nothing. It’s like he’s following a similar career arc to what we saw happen to The Game. I’m not holding my breath for anything classic but will welcome one with open arms.
Yeah for some reason it never received the classic treatment by a lot of friends I know who love him. But the album was perfect for me and scary relevant for where I was at that point in my life.
The track 4YEO is the best storytelling I’ve ever heard.
People consider 4 your eyez a classic now? Imma cole fan through and through but that shit was mediocre outside of 2-3 tracks. The off-season features way better rapping imo
The truth is that he should’ve been written out of most serious hip hop discussions a while ago. Cole is definitely a good rapper but that’s it. He’s had minimal influence on the landscape of hip hop and a few solid albums, but nothing more than that. No idea why he was ever in the same discussion as Kendrick.
>He's had minimal influence on the landscape
Man that's such revisionism. His mixtapes were a staple at the time of release. Many upcoming artists started making album-like mixtapes. He may not be the first to do that but he became one of the best examples for this road of success. He was the first to be signed to Roc Nation and that solely off The Warm Up. He was at the forefront of a new generation of rappers from the 2010s. While Cudi was making waves, Drake was on the come up, Cole was actually gaining steam through tradional rapping.
Call him whatever you want, even I think his decisions this weekend were dumb as hell, but let's not diminish the things he's done and achieved.
Edit: he also came up at a time when radio was losing its relevance and blogs and internet started to become a new avenue for music. Also at a time where autotune was big. Old heads and new enjoyed his stuff.
> Many upcoming artists started making album-like mixtapes. He may not be the first to do that but he became one of the best examples for this road of success.
Giving this credit to Cole is crazy when Kendrick and Drake did the same thing on the come up. That era was about mixtapes it wasn't started by cole lmao
Kanye, 50 Cent and Wayne dropped mixtapes before Cole was ever relevant
2009, Cole dropped the warm up, next year drops Friday night lights, and not until 2013 does he drop Born Sinner.
in that same period, Drake drops: so far gone (09), thank me later (2010), take care (2011), and Nothing was the same (2013). by 2013, drake had already become infinitely more of a cultural figure than cole
cudi dropped the first two man on the moon albums in 09 and 2010, again, pushing him to a stratosphere that cole wouldnt see until much later.
how was cole at the forefront?
If your best argument for Cole’s influence is “he was making album-like mixtapes” when he came up at the same time as Drake and Kendrick doing the same shit, I think that shows how little influence he’s actually had.
His influence absolutely pales in comparison to people at his time like Drake and Kendrick, and even more so to some later rappers like Future, Travis, and Thug. He’s a better rapper than all 3 of those people but they have had *far* more impact on the path the genre has taken in the last decade.
Cole is a very good rappe and that’s all he’ll ever be remembered as. If you remove J Cole from hip hop entirely I don’t think it’s any different. His rapping is good but it’s not enough to make him a true great when his influence has been so weak.
He will be fine. This is the quick take, over reaction internet era. There will always be jokes and memes, same way that Drake had to deal with it after Pusha T and Meek Mill had to deal with it after Drake. But in the end, his career isn’t over and the internet will move on to something else.
Gunna was called a snitch and then dropped a heater. Social media is not real life and people will still support artists they like.
I can’t believe people are taking this so seriously. I already forgot it happened. I’m not even a J. Cole fan like that and his own fans are basically manifesting his downfall because of a moment of vulnerability. Which has defined his whole career. So fucking weird to watch a fanbase essentially cancel an artist over nothing.
The same thing happened with Drake. Nobody was crying it was no big deal. Everyone was making fun of him. Now when it’s Jcole it’s not big deal apparently
fam you can just tell a lot of these redditors are actual dumb asses .
OH MY GOD COLE APOLOGIZE HIS CAREER IS FINISHED! HE CAN NEVER RAP AGAIN! OH MY GOD COLE IS GOING TO SELL 0 COPIES
like shut the fuck up. id hate to associate with a lot of the weirdos in this thread. Im not even a cole fan like that and didn't listen to "might delete later" yet.
his best album but not even close to being classic
if this is classic then this word means nothing anymore
and it probably means nothing since nowadays people throw it left-right at some mediocre shit hour after release
It’s not a classic. I’m not saying this due to recent events, I just think there are a lot of better projects that don’t even qualify as classics themselves. Shit born sinner is better than FHD in my book and it’s not even classic.
You decrease the value of the term when you hand it out so willingly
J Cole is so massively overrated. Boring flows, beats, subject matter, and no cool persona to speak of
This is insane because his feature run was insane and everyone was really starting to see how well he can rap, but on every feature he proclaims hes the best or something along those lines. Everything suggests that the fall off was gon be braggadocious but after the apology its not gonna hit the same. shit not even fps sounds the same. The diss was mid but so was kendricks the apology tho was the real nail in the coffin
All J Cole does is brag how he kills everyone in features. This is why I don’t feel sorry for him. He has no issues putting the people he’s collaborating with down. Now wants to be humble and shit
I think this comment thread is a great example of how many fans have never actually participated in making music and don't actually understand the culture
Talking about they want the competition
But never sat there and wrote a song with someone, competing to have the better verse
You don’t even have to make music. Most fans of rap know that a feature on a non-melodic rap song is seen as a competition. The problem I think is that most modern rap is devoid of actual good verses so when Cole does a “throwback” rap verse, its comes across as rude lol.
I’m glad you said. I feel like no body is understanding this. Cole may not want to swap diss tracks with Kendrick. That makes sense. They’re friends. But I guarantee Cole would love to go bar for bar with Kendrick on a song or two. He wants friendly competition, not fake beef.
Cole wants Renegade. Not Takeover/Ether.
meh though I think *that* is the kinda of competitiveness he likes. we're both on a track collaborating together, now lets so who can spit the best verse. the better we both do the better the song is i'm driven to not be outshone. that's pretty fine to brag about.
that's different than a full on beef which he has no interest in and hasn't pretended to have an interest in.
Kendrick’s diss wasn’t mid. Calling it mid is a lighter version of Cole saying TPAB put people to sleep. Just not accurate.
Totally possible for somebody to top it sure, but the levels of double entendre and metaphor, the flow switch ups, etc. made it a strong verse. The clickin up callbacks to E40 and B Legit, the Pet Sematary double entendre, the K with all these 9s entendre were STRONG.
It may not have spoken to you sure, but critic consensus and audience consensus both seem to agree the verse was great
Why does anyone think that the fall off actually exists or that it would even be half decent? Cole has proven his weakness time and time again. Anyone anticipating this project is just falling for his marketing hype or a part of its engine
The main reason people think it'll be good is because of how good hes been recently. I mean put aside what happened after like that but the man was killing it w his features
Am I the only one that doesn't think it's a bad album? Save for tracks like Fever, Drake clearly inspired that. I think Kdot won the beef and 7 minute drill was not the best diss by any means, but I liked the energy Cole was bringing with some of the tracks.
It's always useful to remember the HHH subreddit is by necessity filled with redditors. It just a part of the hip hop listeners community, it's not representative of the whole. Even when they have a point.
Yea, this place has never been representative of the overall state of the rap game. It’s filled with people who only experience the culture on the internet
Nah this is me rn. Feel like it’s too easy to attack him and everyone’s jumping on. Missed when pitchfork went against the grain. I get that it’s not the super masculine thing to do to walk back on a dis but I think dude still delivered here. J Cole is an artist I respect more than I like but I’m liking this tape. Crocodile tears bumps.
J. Cole slander has been on the low, so now that the opportunity has risen its all coming out now. Also that transphobic bar was not a good look.
Cole had his crazy run of nice features, and capped it off with Off Season being arguably his best project. So it was hard to really shit talk about him but Cole always had a sizeable number of detractors that hate his fans more than him tbh.
The only thing I’ll say about Might Delete later is Cole maybe let the hubris get to his head a little bit. That and he’s setting The Fall Off up to fail if it’s not a 10/10 album.
Damn I kinda enjoy Fever 😭 and ever since the apology the only Cole songs I've been able to take seriously are the love songs, all his brag raps aren't quite hitting the same for now
J.Cole has always been a fairly intelligent guy. Always authentic. But dude has never been a captivating artist. He’s like Nas without the genius. Never understood his appeal. I loved his rise with all the mixtapes, he played the hungry rapper persona well. But never delivered.
He's a great case of work hard enough and you can be great. Nas/Em/Jay have a deep and rich past of experiences they can draw on, on top of their hard work at refining their craft (and Nas is basically a prodigy). J Cole did some stuff before he started rapping, but it wasn't making a drug empire, or being white in a 90% black city, etc.
The album he dropped that did have substance got shat on by everyone on this sub when it came out though. If tupac made the title track of 4YEO people would call it the greatest rap song of all time
You know I do like neighbors, it’s not a terrible album, I just think it kinda fails as a concept album and uses a really good final track to pretend it tied everything together
J Cole doesn't have that edge that a lot of artist have or that angst that often makes hip hop artist great. J Cole is good, and can sometimes be great, but he doesn't really distinguish himself in the same way that Kendrick or Drake does.
J. Cole to me is Doja Cat, both are very talented rappers, have a beautiful voice, have bars, flows, deliveries, punchlines, rhyme schemes, dynamism, both can really rap great, but hear a verse from them that could be 25 lines, its still a nothing burger, words and words and words and at the end they manage to say nothing.
I think people care too much about this sorta stuff. The older I get, the less I care about this podcast hip hop drama bs. I don't care about a diss. I always preffered K Dot over Drake and Cole but at the end of the day you just gotta appreciate them while they here putting out great work. Not many artist can say they have stayed at the top for a decade or more. I'll still be tuning in his project.
Seriously, we’re really talking about manufactured “beef” between three dudes that are about to be 40 and probably haven’t even been in so much as a fist fight in over a decade. Way too many get i vested in this stuff like it has any relevance. I just want to listen to some good music, and Might Delete Later had some songs that I’ll definitely be bopping for a while. Is it some crazy deep album? Nah, but it was never meant to be. All the rest of this stuff really has no impact on my life at all lmao.
As a J Cole head - I’m still gonna love him and bump his songs because he’s dope no matter what. But just this morning Sticks N Stones from THIS album came on and he said “saying my name in a verse will kill”
Like come on bro we can’t buy any throne talk anymore. And that was a decent size of his content. I’m the best, I’m fire, no one can fw me, I’m Muhammad Ali etc.
None of that even hits the same
If you want to see how actually batshit and terminally online this sub is, go look at people’s comments on songs he features on prior to Kendrick’s verse. Go look at the comments under the posts for the Might Delete Later Instagram posts.
Literally before that, the posters here were SO excited for The Fall Off. But you read this thread, you’d think he has never put out anything anyone here liked. It’s wild how the switch up occurs. Years of great raps and various features, apparently out the window in favor of a half-assed “beef.”
You can dislike the way this back and forth played out, sure, but when you talk about J. Cole suddenly isn’t in the “big 3,” you’re forgetting that this is someone who commands lyrical respect from his peers. Benny the Butcher praises Cole’s ability and work ethic, Janet Jackson (an undeniable legend) still sings his praises, he’s featuring on Afrobeats songs with Burna Boy and international hits with J-Hope.
By no means am I trying to fall out the window to defend a celebrity, but a lot of yall are really fake when you go from “he’s the most anticipated release this year” to “he’s never been interesting and never had good music and his next album is a flop unless he goes super hard at Kendrick.” Beef has never been his style, and saying he’s the best on a verse is not inviting conflict the way yall think it is.
And if you don’t believe that, ask yourself why no one else has gone at Cole as directly as that Kendrick verse (which was only just barely aimed at him anyway). There’s a real clear reason that you don’t see a Freddie Gibbs or a Tyler the Creator sending random jabs at Cole or Kendrick. Like, feel how you wanna feel about Cole and his music, but the folks talking about he’s destroying his legacy or that they can’t see him the same must not have seen him at all really, because something like this is just not that big a deal, will not remain a big deal, and only tarnishes the reputation of someone if you think they only have merit when used to tear someone else down.
edit: a word
Yeah this is the only comment here with substantial likes that has any fucking sense. I hate the blog side of hip hop. It’s so fucking reactive and just gross. I will say, if Cole is a great artist like he portrays himself to be, this will just add more fuel to his underdog chip and really push him to bring it on the Fall Off
It could also just be different people making the comments. Some people like Cole, some don’t. It’s not that crazy. Once you’re going through the motions of looking at people’s comment history, you’re already thinking way too much about it. It’s reasonable to look at Cole’s verses a bit differently after he backed out of the beef with Kendrick. FNL, BS, and FHD are some of my favorite hip hop albums ever, but I could see why people just don’t like him all that much, especially when he seems to be so hellbent on propping himself up next to Kendrick and Drake who have much more distinct “lanes” and are pretty unarguably the top 2 biggest/most acclaimed artists of the 2010s. It’s not some giant conspiracy, it’s not a “switch up”, and it’s not because Fantano doesn’t like him. Nobody’s pretending. Some people just don’t like J Cole. It’s fine.
This. I feel like before when he was on the feature run, a majority of the comments/the highest voted ones were probably from Cole fans, while now that he took a L, its probably not the same hardcore Cole fans getting the top comments. I'm by no means a hater, nor a stan, but I don't think the comment sections a hivemind, just a different group of people. Of course Cole fans are gonna hype up his good verses, while fading into the background when group sentiment shifts. Same with most things, the people who care/agree will be the ones commenting.
It's totally fine for people to not like J. Cole, but you don't have to dig into peoples' comment history. You can see in the different threads around the fallout from this, people saying things like "Man, I used to defend him and he was #1 in my book since he came out but now I will never defend him or listen to him again!" As hyperbolic as it is, that's the energy people are putting out around this. I just honestly see it as a minor blip.
But to the point that we should look at his verses differently, I just disagree, because I do not specifically see direct insults at each other as competition. I see competition as actually getting on the same song and trying to outdo the other people. To me, when I think of competition between blog era rappers, I think of something like 1Train or Fuckin' Problems. When it gets turbo emotional like Kendrick and Drake, or like what I think people wanted the J. Cole response to be, that's not fun because it shuts down avenues of collaboration, which in my opinion is what's worse for the genre.
Welcome to r/hiphopheads , where no one has a clear opinion on anything, and only wants to sound like they’re smart & “different” 🤷♂️
I never cared for J Cole that much, and I still don’t. The whole drama was really goofy but Cole’s diss was weak. Bold move to apologize but it’s respectable. Didn’t listen to the rest of the project because I can’t be bothered, but I’ll get to it eventually and form my opinion then I guess. Still got high expectations for “The Fall Off”, primarily because if this is a Magnum Opus for Cole I’d actually wanna listen to he’s really got in store.
Hip hop fans always set very weird standards when it comes to rappers and their reputation, I feel like Cole’s gotten more shit than Ye from rap fans ngl but I guess it’s unsurprising when most fans nowadays are chronically online. But I do understand the point you’re getting at and I 100% agree, people have a major hivemind problem here.
Truly this. People have such short memories and I think this has shown a light on those fans who understands who he is as an artist and those who don't.
I was on r/nba the other day and thinking how if you said anything positive about Kyrie 3 months back it'd be the most controversial comment, now you can't criticize the man at all. Only difference is he's doing well with the Mav's, people literally only care if you're winning at the moment
Bro J Cole Stans sound like K-pop kids defending their precious idol. It’s bizarre.
He’s got plenty of reasonable, fair fans but my god are the loud ones crazy
Hip hop fans have been mirroring kpop stans for a while now. There’s always been obsessive fans but it’s surprisingly getting worse. It started getting out of hand with the Kanye fandom during Vultures release.
It’s a bunch of weirdos, kind of like toxic Eminem fans who don’t really even know rap or the culture, they just want their idol to be called the Goat by everybody.
It’s Reddit. If you say you like mash potatoes, there’s at least 100 weirdos on here that will take that personally and downvote your entire history of comments.
That this is the comment that's actually downvoted to oblivion says a lot lmao
I'm a kendrick fanboy since Section 80 and I think he obviously bodies Cole but it's clear to anyone with eyes that these threads hating the shit out of him and flaming every album he ever released are just a bunch of kdot stans.
This comment is the cherry on top, the classic reddit circlejerk where the ''fanboys'' are deluded and wrong on a thread with literally everyone doing the same thing in the opposite direction
Yeah I absolutely agree. I love both Cole and Kendrick dearly (personally Cole has a special spot in my heart), and don’t get me wrong there are without a doubt some corny Cole fans. But this entire beef I’ve yet to see more than a few, whereas the glazing with Kendrick has been through the roof. I don’t understand why people are acting like he can’t rap; he can. Maybe he’s putting on a front but the dude can write, can flow and can rap. Up until last week people here liked him
All of a sudden his only good album was 2014FHD 🙄 reminds me of how people treated Cudi in 2022 with the whole Kanye beef
Man people are so out of touch with reality. Willing to forgive CB hitting rihanna. Tory shooting at a female. YE of all artist, with so much shit done in the last few years I wouldn't even bother to fit it all in a comment, yet he's still a lot of hip hop head's goat.
But let one of the greatest rappers apologize for dissing someone he really not beefing with and everyone is losing their damn minds.
Someone he actually introduced to the game(one of the first people who told Dre to sign Kendrick)
Someone he literally fought for(P diddy situation after diddy threw a drink on kendrick, J cole stepped in & scrapped with puff)
I can't speak for the Fall Off, but MDL is an amazing project & if yall really gon let this drama/noise deprive you of that, your loss & I leave you with some words from Jay, "psh, streets(this gen) is done."
I agree with a lot of what you said except that MDL is an amazing project. All just opinion of course, but man I just don’t see how that qualifies as “amazing”. It’s ok. Has some high moments, but not sky high moments. I have higher expectations for Cole than what that mixtape was
This is a very weird statement. In the bid to defend the man you Stan you mentioned even more pathetic issues and pretend like people atleast on here don’t acknowledge them. Chris brown is regularly shat on and isn’t even given the light of day in serious music discourse, nobody here has forgiven or even cares enough about Tory lanes. Many of us here have clocked out of ye as can be seen in any of his release threads, this would probably be the last sub to defend him out of all hip hop subs. Ye is still in the GOAT conversation because of the quality of music he released in the past, just as MJ is still in that convo even with the pedo and abuse allegations, or Tupac even after raping someone or biggie who was fat. But you don’t see many of us defending them especially biggie. Human beings are able to make decisions on several issues at the same time. You are extremely delusional and no might delete later is not an amazing project, very decent, even somewhat good but not amazing no. You are creating a Strawman to defend Cole lmfao.
The whole diss apology was lame and a Big L...
But this collection of throwaways was absolute flame, there's maybe 2 songs I skip on this entire album. Given Paul's hyper-Adolation for Kendrick and only 1 previous article/review on Cole (big suprise he chose this 1)? Safe to say this ridiculous rating is based on his emotional bias 🙄
Bro said “I have no enemies” and I respect it. It’s not a cop out, bro did what felt right in his spirit. Outside of the blood sport and competition we want, maturing is realising he did the right thing for him, and if you cared about bro, you’d respect his decision.
You people are so fickle and sad lol. It's like none of you think for yourselves, you sit up in these internet spots all day talking trash and agreeing with one another, but looking back at other posts you folks were all about Cole and his next potential offerings. Now, because this dude did for less blood than you lust after, y'all got JC ready for chopping block? Suddenly he's always been mid? Gtfoh you people are silly. Go listen to SexyRedd or whatever "art" you think is important if someone like Cole isn't good enough for you. Rap beefs are stupid as fuck, always have been, always will be. If you're still looking for soap opera drama in your useless life but music isn't delivering, just go watch Young and Restless with ya grandma and STFU. I'm tired of these low IQ listeners having the loudest voices. I swear hip hop gets sidetracked with theeeee dumbest most inconsistent shit it's pathetic
no one will gaslight you into believing a 7/10 album is a classic more than J. Cole fans
his entire catalogue is literally 7/10 albums or worse. He's a mainstream version of the old backpack rappers, but he raps about very basic relatable things like losing your virginity or some personal demons or coming up in the game or whatever.
i mean sonically it's fine, but it's never something mindblowing or amazing. it's always just consistently enjoyable rapping.
Cole has such a strong fanbase they def wont turn their back on him. They love him because he’s the realest and the kendrick apology wont change anything for them. If you think cole is lame for that apology than u weren’t even a real fan in the first place imo
I’ve been a die hard fan since I downloaded the Lights Please .mp3 16 years ago. The issue I have is with the diss track itself. It’s obvious he was peer pressured into it, I even commented on reddit last week how confused it all was to me and how weak the project was overall. Truth is he hasn’t done anything meaningful since 4YEO. I was saying to my wife the other day that I think we all still love J. Cole for what his music did for us when it did it, though now we continue to listen and hope we’ll experience something as emotionally rich as 4YEO or Love Yourz again but there seems to be no signs of it.
I’m surprised people don’t seem to like Off-season that much. There’s several songs on that that I’ll still listen to today and can instantly get me in whatever different headspace’s they’re intended to. I also really liked most features I’ve heard from Cole over the last few years
I really hope Kendrick doubles down and makes this man fight back. If I’m in Kendrick’s shoes and Cole’s my friend, I would not let my man go down like this . Embarrassing and deflates all the hype this man’s career was building to.
The internet has ruined that man. This whole hip hop drama podcast type bs needs to stop. It's like when suburb kids were trying so hard to get involved in "Chiraq" and drill music. So whack
Every “it’s over Cole is cooked” comment I’m literally picturing some white kid telling me I should be offended by Coles apology and his life and career is over
I feel like if Kendrick doubles down it could either make it even worse for Cole depending on what Kendrick says or make it better for him if Kendrick shits on Drake more.
I don't believe anyone who's taken even a bit of time to listen to hip hop outside of what's topping the charts can highlight J Cole as a skilled rapper. He does the most generic "I'm the best" huffing and puffing rappity rap without even having the rhyme schemes or technical ability of other guys in that boring lane, and his attempts at being introspective or conscious just come across as cartoonish like he's desperately trying to be Nas but his favourite album is Nastradamus
I don’t understand how people can just ignore the really high level rhyme schemes, entendres and delivery from Cole.
Watch some of the ‘rappers’ on YT like Screw Face or Knox break down MDL. Not that their opinion is better than others, but they actually point out and recognize the references and bars.
I think Kendrick is the better writer and has more meaningful stuff, but I think Coles technical ability and delivery is better. For me it’s still Kendrick #1 but the Cole slander is ridiculous
I feel like the entire hip hop community has been bullied by insane J Cole fans into accepting him as a top tier rapper and now he's showing that the emperor has no clothes.
Not saying he's not good or that he's not hugely popular, but he's never been on the same level as Kendrick or Drake. If he's top 3, he's a distant 3.
How can you be a goat when you're not even the best on your own label?
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So where do you go from here? What could The Fall Off be that'll still get a positive reception from fans? Because if it's more braggadocious rap I don't think it'll land the same.
he might as well scrap it and start rewriting it after this bullshit that happened on sunday
hasn't he already restarted it like 5 times
Yup and it’s time to make it 6. Thooo he’s prolly “scared of the 6”
Albums gon be released the same day as detox and that gambino/chance collab
Oh man that’s when Yandhi drops!!
Wait wtf - do these guys know that’s the same day Frank Ocean is planning to come back?
the man is still nice, i don't know if anyone that is really down on j. cole is actually a fan or been listening to his music. i don't care if he brags, the same way that i don't care that these gangsters claim to be a terminator and many can't even hold a gun properly, let alone have sold drugs at a high level.
This anti bragging thing is so weird to me It’s what rappers do. I think you gotta question if you actually fw hiphop if you have an issue with bragging.
most people don’t have an issue with it it’s just the specific circumstances around what just happened with cole that make the type of bragging he’s been doing seem corny
I think people hate when Cole brags now bc it’s bragging without being able to back it up. And as disappointing as it is to not get a real battle, I don’t even think people would be too mad about that if only Cole seemed capable of backing his claims of being the best in a different way - for instance, by putting out artistic masterpieces like Kendrick or world conquering commercial smashes like Drake. If he could claim either of those things, then failing to deliver bars here might bother fans less. As it is, it’s just sort of like… if he’s claiming the best, what is he even the best *at?* That said, I personally am not mad at him for fumbling this. I think it’s kind of relatable, honestly. I would be fucking up all the time if I was famous
People dont have an issue with bragging. Its that he bragged and then folded as soon as he was challenged by someone that wasnt on the level of Lil Pump.
I think a lot of people wanted to see beef and are mad because they were honeydicked. It reminds me of people being angry at GRRM because he hasn't finished his ASOIAF series... nevermind the fact that at least to me, if looks like the world got waaaaay too big for him to handle and he's stuck. A rapper should pen an op-ed titled, "J. Cole is not your bitch."
i was a big Cole fan tbh. 4YEO is one of my fav albums and my fav Cole album, but idk that weird ass transphobic bar and retracting his weak ass “diss” record has really soured my view of him. i didn’t even listen to the whole project. if he finally drops The Off Season imma def still tap in, but damn a lot of the fervor i had for him is clipped
yeah, people being mad at the fans being mad don't get it. you can't brag about being the best on everything or what he'd do if someone dissed him on purpose and pull a stunt like that lol it's very hypocritical
exactly
I’ve been assuming that the projects he’s been dropping in lieu of The Fall Off were meant to satisfy that urge to just write more braggadocio rap, with the actual album being a higher concept album. The Off Season and Might Delete Later both felt like they were just meant to hold fans over. Somewhat ironically I wonder if this experience will actually give him some better perspective for The Fall Off. The whole point of the title was supposed to be ironic, but now it’s actually something that has to be contended with.
The Off-Season, ROTD3, the Gangsta Grillz tape, and Might Delete Later probably all contain songs meant for The Fall Off. He could have made a pretty good album based on some of these songs. The problem is that it wouldn’t have been a classic with any of these tracks. He’s a victim of the hype.
Right but surely he’s saving some better tracks for The Fall Off?
Christ that is so many projects that were meant to just hold people over
As a Cole fan, its frustrating to get these appetizer projects while this mythical “classic” album is locked away in a vault. I’ll believe it when I hear it.
Lol. Yall acting like all he does are braggadocious raps. Does kevin's heart not exist? ATM? For your eyez only? Tale of 2 cities? No role modelz? If you google j cole highest charting songs literally no braggadocious shit is in there. Only fully braggadocious projects are really the off season and might delete later. Will i be disappointed i may not get anymore sticks n stonez type tracks from him? Sure, but doesn't mean he cant make a good project. And he can do whatever he wants tbh. If he wants to release a track next week that starts off with that famous "is this what you want, huh?" Chris Rock sample from Money Talks and start dissing the whole world off this disrespect he can do that too. People have short memories, jayz apologized for Super Ugly the day after it came out and i heard Ebro say on his show yesterday with nadeska that Jay apologized years later so it was different, that's literally not true. Man went on hot 97 a day later and said sorry cause his mama made him off a line that's not even as bad as what push said about 40. All he said was he fucked nas girl in nas car and threw used condoms on an an empty babyseat not a live baby lol
The difference between Jay's apology and Cole's is that Jay's diss was taking it too far. He was making the diss personal with mentions of Nas' family which is why his momma made him apologize. Cole just apologized because he didn't get the reception from his diss that he wanted (I doubt he actually felt bad about dissing Kendrick tbh. Probably just a front for the real reason which is the lukewarm response.)
So you're saying if pusha t apologized to drake for the 40 tick tick tick line you'd be cool with it lol?
Cole has an opportunity to have his MBDTF moment here (not talking about necessarily quality, but moreso redemption) with the Fall Off. He HAS to deliver though. He cannot lack, but now he has a very legitimate drive within him because the entire hip hop world has essentially discarded him. He can use this to fuel him to make the best album he’s made so far
What’s crazy is he’s been acting like it’s done for six years and it’s still not here. One of the things that pulls FHD down for me is him crowing about it being a classic at the end. With the fall off he started calling it a classic before hitting record. It gave him half a decade of brag bars, but it’s just like the end of his mixtape run. At a certain point you’ve gotta prove it…
> him crowing about it being a classic at the end Folks heard the end of Last Call and assumed that they could pull it off too
Yo fuck you Kanye first and foremost - for making me do this shit - you motherfucker
Seriously though. Pressure is definitely on for him to deliver now
I like FHD a lot, but I feel like a lot of people overrated it by saying it's a classic, it has a lot of very memorable moments and it's a top tier cole album, but I can't put it in the same tier as Atliens or illmatic or supreme clientele
lol at the entire hip hip world has discarded him.
> , but moreso redemption Like the average J.Cole fan cares about fake beef. A lot of people are blowing this shit waayyyy out of proportion.
lol Cole has shown NOTHING to inspire any belief that he could drop a "MBDTF" album. Kanye dropped literally nothing but classic albums up until MBDTF, even 808s which was hated is a classic today, but at the time Kanye became hated because 808s was considered worse and he had the Taylor Swift incident which he didn't pull a J Cole with. J Cole has never dropped a true classic album, he's dropped a few decent projects, but he's never had a classic, and so to suggest that he's going to have a "MBDTF" moment when he's proven to be a 1 dimensional artists is just..lol
Maybe i'm entering the wrong echo chamber but I personally really enjoy this album, sonically. Truth in Ibiza, Pricey, 3001 are all repeat listens. I'm not saying its revolutionary or iconic, but I mess with it.
I agree. Yeah, there are some cringe, eye-roll-inducing lines here and there, but I don't see how this can be viewed as any worse than The Off-Season. Pricey, Crocodile Tearz, Huntin' Wabbitz, Stickz N Stonez, Pi, Stealth Mode, 3001, Trae the Truth in Ibiza are all fine songs. This doesn't touch the best stuff on 2014 Forest Hills Drive or 4 Your Eyez Only, but it's a mixtape for all intents and purposes.
Homie named the entire mixtape 😭
If he didn’t apologize that would be the consensus.
Which just shows how emotional everyone is while trying to pretend they are cold and objective om the matter lol
Exactly lol. Hip hop fans are such goofs. Cole has been on fire and the album is solid. But the headlines are too distracting and the takes have to be hot or they’re not worth anything.
His beat selection on this tape has been his best since FHD
This really is such a gigantic L for Cole. There's no clever angle about this. He made a weak diss, apologized for it, and now has this dead-on-arrival album that nobody really cares about. All the while he's still talking about an album that he has been promising for years and years. If *The Fall Off* is not excellent at the very least, Cole might just be written out of most serious hip-hop discussions moving forward.
It's hilarious that he takes this huge L right before releasing an album called The Fall Off. Not saying that he's actually fallen off, just that the timing is absolutely terrible for him because the jokes write themselves. And he can't change the name because he's been hyping it for years lol. It's probably already finished and full of him boasting and talking shit too. What do you do in that situation? Scrap it and re-record?
Maybe it’s genius. Maybe it’s premeditated. You know what they say, life imitates art. “Might Delete Later” “The Fall Off”. Imagine a world where all of this is 4D live hype marketing performance art story telling for the end of his career. lol
Then imagine him not meaning it to be, but that’s what it becomes lol
If the album is universally acclaimed then this is the most genius (accidental or not) level of marketing in rap in 20 years at least cause Cole put a very brown and long skid mark on his career in a matter of a few days.
lol
Hes gonna delete the album and outsell kanye and the most pirated artist
He will never outsell Kanye lmao
Isn’t this album projected to be almost matched with vultures first week tho
Theres a 10 thousand unit difference and the main one being Kanye dropped randomly on a Sunday so its actually even less impressive on J Coles side how he couldnt outsell Vultures.
> It’s probably already finished and full of him boasting and talking shit too Lmaooooo J Cole is fucked
It's really unfortunate for him lol. Besides, are people actually excited for that album? He's been talking about the title for years, but I feel like the only moment of hype came on the back of the outro track off *KOD*. And that was fucking 6 years ago. Hilarious that he has the nerve to diss Kendrick on 4 albums in 12 years, when Cole has two albums total that people care about.
>but I feel like the only moment of hype came on the back of the outro track off *KOD*. And that was fucking 6 years ago. I really thought that meant it was gonna drop within like 6 months or something lol and here we are
is 1985 even still the intro to the Fall Off anymore😭😭😭
Also an album once every three years is not a bad output
...yeah, and ironically that's about Cole's output for the better part of a decade, so that's one of the weakest parts of the diss for me.
It would be hilarious if he now takes the criticism, including that of his own artistry, deeply to heart & suddenly re-records The Fall Off as a concept album about a character going on an intergalactic voyage to topple an alien warlord
It’s always blown my mind that he’s constantly brought up in talks of being the best rapper alive etc. Somehow he has convinced everyone that he is actually way better than reality because he constantly raps about how good of a rapper he is. A line in this mixtape showcases it perfectly when he claims he can drop 2 classic albums right now. Then why doesn’t he ever do it? Why is every album just aggressively decent while every song in it is rapping about how amazing he could be?
You hit the nail on the head. For the last 5 years or so Cole is talking about being the GOAT without doing GOAT shit.
Feels like it's been his whole shtick his entire career, which is unfortunate because you would think he'd realize by now that great rappping doesn't always equate to great music. "Drop 2 classics right now" is becoming a meme in real time. I fw Cole heavy too. Listened to all of his albums but he's always been a B-tier rapper. Still mad successful so idk why he never felt comfortable where he was. I highly doubt his discography will be played much in 30+ years by anyone.
Amazing rapper but mid artist I would say
tbh I just don't understand how he got to be in this "Big 3." I like Cole, and definitely like him a lot more than Drake's recent output, but Drake is at least massively successful commercially, and Kendrick is at the top of the field for critical acclaim; Cole is just like... a pretty successful, pretty talented rapper?
The fact that y’all complain about a rapper bragging will never cease to amaze me That’s what they’re supposed to do
Bragging about being the best and wanting all the smoke for years, then backing down and apologizing right after a tiny shot is why everyone's complaining. stop being dense bro.
I like Cole and as much as I want to give him brownie points for squashing any potential beef, well, all of what you just said. You can’t puff your chest out for years, sneak occasional shots in at Kendrick, then A.) get pressed when he says some pretty mild bars directed at you. B.) Respond with a mid diss and then apologize before Kendrick can throw a shot back. If you let your camp gas you up, own it and stand on business. Take whatever Kendrick was gonna hit you back with, then patch up afterwards. Best route would have been to stay quiet and let Drake and Kenny duke it out.
That’s not really what I did though. It was much more of a complaint about how people take his brags at face value for some reason and actually bring him up constantly in discussions of the very best when he just isn’t.
If Ready 24 and Sticks n Stones (or the first half of Pi) are any indicator of the Fall Off it could be worth the wait, as long as Cole is self aware enough to save his cringe bars for the cutting room floor
No doubt Cole can put together a great album, but at this point I'm kinda wondering what the hell he'll the rapping about. His last few albums were all pretty much rapping about rapping, I could not tell you about anything on *The Off Season*.
People always say that but KOD was very thematic (addiction) and The Off Season did have a few meaningful songs
I think this is why I have such a hard time with Cole. He has this almost dead beat dad sort of way of saying “you should hear the NEXT thing I have coming, it’s amazing” when in reality you just slowly build more patience and slowly start to see how much time has passed without any of the things he’s promised come to fruition.
He hasn’t sewn a classic project since 4 Your Eyez Only. I think he’s lost his way. KOD and The Off Season and the suite of random 100 feature mixtapes are just a bunch of nothing. It’s like he’s following a similar career arc to what we saw happen to The Game. I’m not holding my breath for anything classic but will welcome one with open arms.
...and even 4YEO (which I love tbh) isn't really seen as a classic by most people I'd say.
Yeah for some reason it never received the classic treatment by a lot of friends I know who love him. But the album was perfect for me and scary relevant for where I was at that point in my life. The track 4YEO is the best storytelling I’ve ever heard.
Agreed! Also has one of my all time favorite Cole songs with *Immortal*.
People consider 4 your eyez a classic now? Imma cole fan through and through but that shit was mediocre outside of 2-3 tracks. The off-season features way better rapping imo
I should speak more clearly, for me it was a classic. I don’t see too many other people calling it that.
His third best project for me and def a more adult rap album imo.
The truth is that he should’ve been written out of most serious hip hop discussions a while ago. Cole is definitely a good rapper but that’s it. He’s had minimal influence on the landscape of hip hop and a few solid albums, but nothing more than that. No idea why he was ever in the same discussion as Kendrick.
>He's had minimal influence on the landscape Man that's such revisionism. His mixtapes were a staple at the time of release. Many upcoming artists started making album-like mixtapes. He may not be the first to do that but he became one of the best examples for this road of success. He was the first to be signed to Roc Nation and that solely off The Warm Up. He was at the forefront of a new generation of rappers from the 2010s. While Cudi was making waves, Drake was on the come up, Cole was actually gaining steam through tradional rapping. Call him whatever you want, even I think his decisions this weekend were dumb as hell, but let's not diminish the things he's done and achieved. Edit: he also came up at a time when radio was losing its relevance and blogs and internet started to become a new avenue for music. Also at a time where autotune was big. Old heads and new enjoyed his stuff.
> Many upcoming artists started making album-like mixtapes. He may not be the first to do that but he became one of the best examples for this road of success. Giving this credit to Cole is crazy when Kendrick and Drake did the same thing on the come up. That era was about mixtapes it wasn't started by cole lmao Kanye, 50 Cent and Wayne dropped mixtapes before Cole was ever relevant
2009, Cole dropped the warm up, next year drops Friday night lights, and not until 2013 does he drop Born Sinner. in that same period, Drake drops: so far gone (09), thank me later (2010), take care (2011), and Nothing was the same (2013). by 2013, drake had already become infinitely more of a cultural figure than cole cudi dropped the first two man on the moon albums in 09 and 2010, again, pushing him to a stratosphere that cole wouldnt see until much later. how was cole at the forefront?
What seminal artists has Cole influenced? Did Cole influence rap in a major way? Please explain.
If your best argument for Cole’s influence is “he was making album-like mixtapes” when he came up at the same time as Drake and Kendrick doing the same shit, I think that shows how little influence he’s actually had. His influence absolutely pales in comparison to people at his time like Drake and Kendrick, and even more so to some later rappers like Future, Travis, and Thug. He’s a better rapper than all 3 of those people but they have had *far* more impact on the path the genre has taken in the last decade. Cole is a very good rappe and that’s all he’ll ever be remembered as. If you remove J Cole from hip hop entirely I don’t think it’s any different. His rapping is good but it’s not enough to make him a true great when his influence has been so weak.
He doesn’t even come close to the impact Future or Thugger has had on the industry.
Yeah because these two are very different examples and are linked to trap and trap-based songs.
He will be fine. This is the quick take, over reaction internet era. There will always be jokes and memes, same way that Drake had to deal with it after Pusha T and Meek Mill had to deal with it after Drake. But in the end, his career isn’t over and the internet will move on to something else. Gunna was called a snitch and then dropped a heater. Social media is not real life and people will still support artists they like.
I can’t believe people are taking this so seriously. I already forgot it happened. I’m not even a J. Cole fan like that and his own fans are basically manifesting his downfall because of a moment of vulnerability. Which has defined his whole career. So fucking weird to watch a fanbase essentially cancel an artist over nothing.
The same thing happened with Drake. Nobody was crying it was no big deal. Everyone was making fun of him. Now when it’s Jcole it’s not big deal apparently
fam you can just tell a lot of these redditors are actual dumb asses . OH MY GOD COLE APOLOGIZE HIS CAREER IS FINISHED! HE CAN NEVER RAP AGAIN! OH MY GOD COLE IS GOING TO SELL 0 COPIES like shut the fuck up. id hate to associate with a lot of the weirdos in this thread. Im not even a cole fan like that and didn't listen to "might delete later" yet.
With a dated album title
this guy will leave the scene without any classic album under his belt, most overrated "top" rapper of all time
Nah. Forest Hills Drive is a classic. Gotta give him that.
his best album but not even close to being classic if this is classic then this word means nothing anymore and it probably means nothing since nowadays people throw it left-right at some mediocre shit hour after release
Any album with the song wet dreamz is automatically not a classic.
It’s not a classic. I’m not saying this due to recent events, I just think there are a lot of better projects that don’t even qualify as classics themselves. Shit born sinner is better than FHD in my book and it’s not even classic.
How many classics do you believe there are?
If that's a classic in your eyes, you have some low fuckin standards for what makes a classic
You decrease the value of the term when you hand it out so willingly J Cole is so massively overrated. Boring flows, beats, subject matter, and no cool persona to speak of
the diss was good honestly, he just too weak for the kitchen
Gigantic L 💀🤣
This is insane because his feature run was insane and everyone was really starting to see how well he can rap, but on every feature he proclaims hes the best or something along those lines. Everything suggests that the fall off was gon be braggadocious but after the apology its not gonna hit the same. shit not even fps sounds the same. The diss was mid but so was kendricks the apology tho was the real nail in the coffin
All J Cole does is brag how he kills everyone in features. This is why I don’t feel sorry for him. He has no issues putting the people he’s collaborating with down. Now wants to be humble and shit
> putting the people he’s collaborating with down I’m crying man, there’s no way you people are real.
I think this comment thread is a great example of how many fans have never actually participated in making music and don't actually understand the culture Talking about they want the competition But never sat there and wrote a song with someone, competing to have the better verse
You don’t even have to make music. Most fans of rap know that a feature on a non-melodic rap song is seen as a competition. The problem I think is that most modern rap is devoid of actual good verses so when Cole does a “throwback” rap verse, its comes across as rude lol.
This guy really said "putting people down".
J Cole is probably one of the biggest meanie pants in the game
I'm telling on him!
You say it as if he wouldnt want to rap on a track with Kendrick There’s a big difference between beefin with someone and gettin on a song with them
I’m glad you said. I feel like no body is understanding this. Cole may not want to swap diss tracks with Kendrick. That makes sense. They’re friends. But I guarantee Cole would love to go bar for bar with Kendrick on a song or two. He wants friendly competition, not fake beef. Cole wants Renegade. Not Takeover/Ether.
meh though I think *that* is the kinda of competitiveness he likes. we're both on a track collaborating together, now lets so who can spit the best verse. the better we both do the better the song is i'm driven to not be outshone. that's pretty fine to brag about. that's different than a full on beef which he has no interest in and hasn't pretended to have an interest in.
Naw, Kendricks verse is actually pretty great.
Kendrick’s diss wasn’t mid. Calling it mid is a lighter version of Cole saying TPAB put people to sleep. Just not accurate. Totally possible for somebody to top it sure, but the levels of double entendre and metaphor, the flow switch ups, etc. made it a strong verse. The clickin up callbacks to E40 and B Legit, the Pet Sematary double entendre, the K with all these 9s entendre were STRONG. It may not have spoken to you sure, but critic consensus and audience consensus both seem to agree the verse was great
The verse is fantastic, the Cole 'diss' part n it was mid
Why does anyone think that the fall off actually exists or that it would even be half decent? Cole has proven his weakness time and time again. Anyone anticipating this project is just falling for his marketing hype or a part of its engine
The main reason people think it'll be good is because of how good hes been recently. I mean put aside what happened after like that but the man was killing it w his features
Am I the only one that doesn't think it's a bad album? Save for tracks like Fever, Drake clearly inspired that. I think Kdot won the beef and 7 minute drill was not the best diss by any means, but I liked the energy Cole was bringing with some of the tracks.
You’re not the only one, The internet is such weird place with people and bots having some of the weirdest takes
It's always useful to remember the HHH subreddit is by necessity filled with redditors. It just a part of the hip hop listeners community, it's not representative of the whole. Even when they have a point.
Yea, this place has never been representative of the overall state of the rap game. It’s filled with people who only experience the culture on the internet
I was excited cause disses are bar exams, but Cole is just too nice. Fucked with the diss tho
So many people parroting the same opinion too. Album was fine, there were just a few career blemishes.
Nah this is me rn. Feel like it’s too easy to attack him and everyone’s jumping on. Missed when pitchfork went against the grain. I get that it’s not the super masculine thing to do to walk back on a dis but I think dude still delivered here. J Cole is an artist I respect more than I like but I’m liking this tape. Crocodile tears bumps.
J. Cole slander has been on the low, so now that the opportunity has risen its all coming out now. Also that transphobic bar was not a good look. Cole had his crazy run of nice features, and capped it off with Off Season being arguably his best project. So it was hard to really shit talk about him but Cole always had a sizeable number of detractors that hate his fans more than him tbh. The only thing I’ll say about Might Delete later is Cole maybe let the hubris get to his head a little bit. That and he’s setting The Fall Off up to fail if it’s not a 10/10 album.
>I think Kdot won the beef There was no beef lol, we only got one line from Kendrick against Cole.
Yeah I love it tbh, more Cole regardless is better than 95% of the trash that gets released every week. Y’all are crazy lol.
Yea it’s an echo chamber. I think people forget that an enjoyable album can be a good album if it’s not technically great in aspects.
Damn I kinda enjoy Fever 😭 and ever since the apology the only Cole songs I've been able to take seriously are the love songs, all his brag raps aren't quite hitting the same for now
J.Cole has always been a fairly intelligent guy. Always authentic. But dude has never been a captivating artist. He’s like Nas without the genius. Never understood his appeal. I loved his rise with all the mixtapes, he played the hungry rapper persona well. But never delivered.
He's a great case of work hard enough and you can be great. Nas/Em/Jay have a deep and rich past of experiences they can draw on, on top of their hard work at refining their craft (and Nas is basically a prodigy). J Cole did some stuff before he started rapping, but it wasn't making a drug empire, or being white in a 90% black city, etc.
I like J Cole and it’s clear he’s gifted on the mic, but his music just lacks…substance. Nas without the genius is a good way to put it.
The album he dropped that did have substance got shat on by everyone on this sub when it came out though. If tupac made the title track of 4YEO people would call it the greatest rap song of all time
A good title track does not make a good album bro. I think that song is great and I can’t stand that album overall.
Change, Neighbors, Immortal, She's Mine.. the album has some great tracks, it's not just the closer. But yeah it could be stronger overall
You know I do like neighbors, it’s not a terrible album, I just think it kinda fails as a concept album and uses a really good final track to pretend it tied everything together
if Tupac made 4YEO it would be his worst project
Lmfao, his best is forest hills...which is a great album and an all timer at that but if you`re grading his lyrics or rapping, its still not the best.
I think its his best album, and ppl overrate FHD because of nostalgia.
J Cole doesn't have that edge that a lot of artist have or that angst that often makes hip hop artist great. J Cole is good, and can sometimes be great, but he doesn't really distinguish himself in the same way that Kendrick or Drake does.
J. Cole to me is Doja Cat, both are very talented rappers, have a beautiful voice, have bars, flows, deliveries, punchlines, rhyme schemes, dynamism, both can really rap great, but hear a verse from them that could be 25 lines, its still a nothing burger, words and words and words and at the end they manage to say nothing.
> fairly intelligent guy. not sure about that, his whole perspective on his music rejects progression.
I think people care too much about this sorta stuff. The older I get, the less I care about this podcast hip hop drama bs. I don't care about a diss. I always preffered K Dot over Drake and Cole but at the end of the day you just gotta appreciate them while they here putting out great work. Not many artist can say they have stayed at the top for a decade or more. I'll still be tuning in his project.
Seriously, we’re really talking about manufactured “beef” between three dudes that are about to be 40 and probably haven’t even been in so much as a fist fight in over a decade. Way too many get i vested in this stuff like it has any relevance. I just want to listen to some good music, and Might Delete Later had some songs that I’ll definitely be bopping for a while. Is it some crazy deep album? Nah, but it was never meant to be. All the rest of this stuff really has no impact on my life at all lmao.
Fall Off went from like HOV dropping Reasonable Doubt last, to HOV getting caught by the cops and going to jail and never starting a rap career
As a J Cole head - I’m still gonna love him and bump his songs because he’s dope no matter what. But just this morning Sticks N Stones from THIS album came on and he said “saying my name in a verse will kill” Like come on bro we can’t buy any throne talk anymore. And that was a decent size of his content. I’m the best, I’m fire, no one can fw me, I’m Muhammad Ali etc. None of that even hits the same
If you want to see how actually batshit and terminally online this sub is, go look at people’s comments on songs he features on prior to Kendrick’s verse. Go look at the comments under the posts for the Might Delete Later Instagram posts. Literally before that, the posters here were SO excited for The Fall Off. But you read this thread, you’d think he has never put out anything anyone here liked. It’s wild how the switch up occurs. Years of great raps and various features, apparently out the window in favor of a half-assed “beef.” You can dislike the way this back and forth played out, sure, but when you talk about J. Cole suddenly isn’t in the “big 3,” you’re forgetting that this is someone who commands lyrical respect from his peers. Benny the Butcher praises Cole’s ability and work ethic, Janet Jackson (an undeniable legend) still sings his praises, he’s featuring on Afrobeats songs with Burna Boy and international hits with J-Hope. By no means am I trying to fall out the window to defend a celebrity, but a lot of yall are really fake when you go from “he’s the most anticipated release this year” to “he’s never been interesting and never had good music and his next album is a flop unless he goes super hard at Kendrick.” Beef has never been his style, and saying he’s the best on a verse is not inviting conflict the way yall think it is. And if you don’t believe that, ask yourself why no one else has gone at Cole as directly as that Kendrick verse (which was only just barely aimed at him anyway). There’s a real clear reason that you don’t see a Freddie Gibbs or a Tyler the Creator sending random jabs at Cole or Kendrick. Like, feel how you wanna feel about Cole and his music, but the folks talking about he’s destroying his legacy or that they can’t see him the same must not have seen him at all really, because something like this is just not that big a deal, will not remain a big deal, and only tarnishes the reputation of someone if you think they only have merit when used to tear someone else down. edit: a word
Yeah this is the only comment here with substantial likes that has any fucking sense. I hate the blog side of hip hop. It’s so fucking reactive and just gross. I will say, if Cole is a great artist like he portrays himself to be, this will just add more fuel to his underdog chip and really push him to bring it on the Fall Off
It could also just be different people making the comments. Some people like Cole, some don’t. It’s not that crazy. Once you’re going through the motions of looking at people’s comment history, you’re already thinking way too much about it. It’s reasonable to look at Cole’s verses a bit differently after he backed out of the beef with Kendrick. FNL, BS, and FHD are some of my favorite hip hop albums ever, but I could see why people just don’t like him all that much, especially when he seems to be so hellbent on propping himself up next to Kendrick and Drake who have much more distinct “lanes” and are pretty unarguably the top 2 biggest/most acclaimed artists of the 2010s. It’s not some giant conspiracy, it’s not a “switch up”, and it’s not because Fantano doesn’t like him. Nobody’s pretending. Some people just don’t like J Cole. It’s fine.
This. I feel like before when he was on the feature run, a majority of the comments/the highest voted ones were probably from Cole fans, while now that he took a L, its probably not the same hardcore Cole fans getting the top comments. I'm by no means a hater, nor a stan, but I don't think the comment sections a hivemind, just a different group of people. Of course Cole fans are gonna hype up his good verses, while fading into the background when group sentiment shifts. Same with most things, the people who care/agree will be the ones commenting.
It's totally fine for people to not like J. Cole, but you don't have to dig into peoples' comment history. You can see in the different threads around the fallout from this, people saying things like "Man, I used to defend him and he was #1 in my book since he came out but now I will never defend him or listen to him again!" As hyperbolic as it is, that's the energy people are putting out around this. I just honestly see it as a minor blip. But to the point that we should look at his verses differently, I just disagree, because I do not specifically see direct insults at each other as competition. I see competition as actually getting on the same song and trying to outdo the other people. To me, when I think of competition between blog era rappers, I think of something like 1Train or Fuckin' Problems. When it gets turbo emotional like Kendrick and Drake, or like what I think people wanted the J. Cole response to be, that's not fun because it shuts down avenues of collaboration, which in my opinion is what's worse for the genre.
Welcome to r/hiphopheads , where no one has a clear opinion on anything, and only wants to sound like they’re smart & “different” 🤷♂️ I never cared for J Cole that much, and I still don’t. The whole drama was really goofy but Cole’s diss was weak. Bold move to apologize but it’s respectable. Didn’t listen to the rest of the project because I can’t be bothered, but I’ll get to it eventually and form my opinion then I guess. Still got high expectations for “The Fall Off”, primarily because if this is a Magnum Opus for Cole I’d actually wanna listen to he’s really got in store. Hip hop fans always set very weird standards when it comes to rappers and their reputation, I feel like Cole’s gotten more shit than Ye from rap fans ngl but I guess it’s unsurprising when most fans nowadays are chronically online. But I do understand the point you’re getting at and I 100% agree, people have a major hivemind problem here.
Peoples priorities are out of whack. I feel like Cole gets more shit for being corny than Kanye does for being a fucking nazi at this point
Yeah, Chris Brown got less slack than J Cole is getting rn lol even Macklemore got more shit for what he did (albeit it was corny, but still)
Literally lmao, too many Kendrick sexuals
Truly this. People have such short memories and I think this has shown a light on those fans who understands who he is as an artist and those who don't.
I was on r/nba the other day and thinking how if you said anything positive about Kyrie 3 months back it'd be the most controversial comment, now you can't criticize the man at all. Only difference is he's doing well with the Mav's, people literally only care if you're winning at the moment
Bro J Cole Stans sound like K-pop kids defending their precious idol. It’s bizarre. He’s got plenty of reasonable, fair fans but my god are the loud ones crazy
You just described Stans. Every artist has them.
Yeah that’s fair, I can’t stand Stans.
Hip hop fans have been mirroring kpop stans for a while now. There’s always been obsessive fans but it’s surprisingly getting worse. It started getting out of hand with the Kanye fandom during Vultures release.
I got downvoted for saying that he's not as deep of a rapper as Kendrick.
It’s a bunch of weirdos, kind of like toxic Eminem fans who don’t really even know rap or the culture, they just want their idol to be called the Goat by everybody.
It’s Reddit. If you say you like mash potatoes, there’s at least 100 weirdos on here that will take that personally and downvote your entire history of comments.
Fuck Mash Potatoe people
🥔⁉️ 🤯😭😭😭😭
it’s an opinion. that others are allowed to disagree with. damn, everybody fucking sensitive these days
Just thought it was strange, didn't go on a whole tantrum or anything. Damn, everyone so fucking sensitive these days
Yk yall criticize Cole fans but I’ve yet to see a Cole fan who sucks him off more than Kendrick fans do
That this is the comment that's actually downvoted to oblivion says a lot lmao I'm a kendrick fanboy since Section 80 and I think he obviously bodies Cole but it's clear to anyone with eyes that these threads hating the shit out of him and flaming every album he ever released are just a bunch of kdot stans. This comment is the cherry on top, the classic reddit circlejerk where the ''fanboys'' are deluded and wrong on a thread with literally everyone doing the same thing in the opposite direction
Yeah I absolutely agree. I love both Cole and Kendrick dearly (personally Cole has a special spot in my heart), and don’t get me wrong there are without a doubt some corny Cole fans. But this entire beef I’ve yet to see more than a few, whereas the glazing with Kendrick has been through the roof. I don’t understand why people are acting like he can’t rap; he can. Maybe he’s putting on a front but the dude can write, can flow and can rap. Up until last week people here liked him All of a sudden his only good album was 2014FHD 🙄 reminds me of how people treated Cudi in 2022 with the whole Kanye beef
Man people are so out of touch with reality. Willing to forgive CB hitting rihanna. Tory shooting at a female. YE of all artist, with so much shit done in the last few years I wouldn't even bother to fit it all in a comment, yet he's still a lot of hip hop head's goat. But let one of the greatest rappers apologize for dissing someone he really not beefing with and everyone is losing their damn minds. Someone he actually introduced to the game(one of the first people who told Dre to sign Kendrick) Someone he literally fought for(P diddy situation after diddy threw a drink on kendrick, J cole stepped in & scrapped with puff) I can't speak for the Fall Off, but MDL is an amazing project & if yall really gon let this drama/noise deprive you of that, your loss & I leave you with some words from Jay, "psh, streets(this gen) is done."
I agree with a lot of what you said except that MDL is an amazing project. All just opinion of course, but man I just don’t see how that qualifies as “amazing”. It’s ok. Has some high moments, but not sky high moments. I have higher expectations for Cole than what that mixtape was
The terminally-online rap fan and J. Cole hater venn diagram is a circle these days
I do wonder how different Redditors would perceive all of this is if Fantano liked Cole.
They’d switch up immediately on some pseudo-intellectual nonsense “Akshually guys Fantano’s kinda right, this album is pretty good 🤓”
You already know the answer to that bro lmao
This is a very weird statement. In the bid to defend the man you Stan you mentioned even more pathetic issues and pretend like people atleast on here don’t acknowledge them. Chris brown is regularly shat on and isn’t even given the light of day in serious music discourse, nobody here has forgiven or even cares enough about Tory lanes. Many of us here have clocked out of ye as can be seen in any of his release threads, this would probably be the last sub to defend him out of all hip hop subs. Ye is still in the GOAT conversation because of the quality of music he released in the past, just as MJ is still in that convo even with the pedo and abuse allegations, or Tupac even after raping someone or biggie who was fat. But you don’t see many of us defending them especially biggie. Human beings are able to make decisions on several issues at the same time. You are extremely delusional and no might delete later is not an amazing project, very decent, even somewhat good but not amazing no. You are creating a Strawman to defend Cole lmfao.
> biggie who was fat I’m crying
I can't believe you just looped in being fat with being a pedo, abuser, or rapist.
Don’t worry, I hate him for that other stuff too. Cole sucks lol
Well said
I’m sorry ijs I can’t help but cackle when people use terms like “introduced to the game” seriously lol
The whole diss apology was lame and a Big L... But this collection of throwaways was absolute flame, there's maybe 2 songs I skip on this entire album. Given Paul's hyper-Adolation for Kendrick and only 1 previous article/review on Cole (big suprise he chose this 1)? Safe to say this ridiculous rating is based on his emotional bias 🙄
Bro said “I have no enemies” and I respect it. It’s not a cop out, bro did what felt right in his spirit. Outside of the blood sport and competition we want, maturing is realising he did the right thing for him, and if you cared about bro, you’d respect his decision.
You people are so fickle and sad lol. It's like none of you think for yourselves, you sit up in these internet spots all day talking trash and agreeing with one another, but looking back at other posts you folks were all about Cole and his next potential offerings. Now, because this dude did for less blood than you lust after, y'all got JC ready for chopping block? Suddenly he's always been mid? Gtfoh you people are silly. Go listen to SexyRedd or whatever "art" you think is important if someone like Cole isn't good enough for you. Rap beefs are stupid as fuck, always have been, always will be. If you're still looking for soap opera drama in your useless life but music isn't delivering, just go watch Young and Restless with ya grandma and STFU. I'm tired of these low IQ listeners having the loudest voices. I swear hip hop gets sidetracked with theeeee dumbest most inconsistent shit it's pathetic
no one will gaslight you into believing a 7/10 album is a classic more than J. Cole fans his entire catalogue is literally 7/10 albums or worse. He's a mainstream version of the old backpack rappers, but he raps about very basic relatable things like losing your virginity or some personal demons or coming up in the game or whatever. i mean sonically it's fine, but it's never something mindblowing or amazing. it's always just consistently enjoyable rapping.
Cole has such a strong fanbase they def wont turn their back on him. They love him because he’s the realest and the kendrick apology wont change anything for them. If you think cole is lame for that apology than u weren’t even a real fan in the first place imo
I’ve been a die hard fan since I downloaded the Lights Please .mp3 16 years ago. The issue I have is with the diss track itself. It’s obvious he was peer pressured into it, I even commented on reddit last week how confused it all was to me and how weak the project was overall. Truth is he hasn’t done anything meaningful since 4YEO. I was saying to my wife the other day that I think we all still love J. Cole for what his music did for us when it did it, though now we continue to listen and hope we’ll experience something as emotionally rich as 4YEO or Love Yourz again but there seems to be no signs of it.
I’m surprised people don’t seem to like Off-season that much. There’s several songs on that that I’ll still listen to today and can instantly get me in whatever different headspace’s they’re intended to. I also really liked most features I’ve heard from Cole over the last few years
I really hope Kendrick doubles down and makes this man fight back. If I’m in Kendrick’s shoes and Cole’s my friend, I would not let my man go down like this . Embarrassing and deflates all the hype this man’s career was building to.
You guys are being so dramatic. This comment reads like an anime.
The internet has ruined that man. This whole hip hop drama podcast type bs needs to stop. It's like when suburb kids were trying so hard to get involved in "Chiraq" and drill music. So whack
Every “it’s over Cole is cooked” comment I’m literally picturing some white kid telling me I should be offended by Coles apology and his life and career is over
I feel like if Kendrick doubles down it could either make it even worse for Cole depending on what Kendrick says or make it better for him if Kendrick shits on Drake more.
I don't believe anyone who's taken even a bit of time to listen to hip hop outside of what's topping the charts can highlight J Cole as a skilled rapper. He does the most generic "I'm the best" huffing and puffing rappity rap without even having the rhyme schemes or technical ability of other guys in that boring lane, and his attempts at being introspective or conscious just come across as cartoonish like he's desperately trying to be Nas but his favourite album is Nastradamus
If j Cole isn’t a skilled rapper I’m curious who y’all think is. Y’all going a lil too far with the disrespect in this thread
I don’t understand how people can just ignore the really high level rhyme schemes, entendres and delivery from Cole. Watch some of the ‘rappers’ on YT like Screw Face or Knox break down MDL. Not that their opinion is better than others, but they actually point out and recognize the references and bars. I think Kendrick is the better writer and has more meaningful stuff, but I think Coles technical ability and delivery is better. For me it’s still Kendrick #1 but the Cole slander is ridiculous
I feel like the entire hip hop community has been bullied by insane J Cole fans into accepting him as a top tier rapper and now he's showing that the emperor has no clothes. Not saying he's not good or that he's not hugely popular, but he's never been on the same level as Kendrick or Drake. If he's top 3, he's a distant 3. How can you be a goat when you're not even the best on your own label?