J. Cole Asks Kanye West To Clear A Sample At Dreamville Festival

J. Cole pleaded with Kanye West to clear a sample for him on stage at Dreamville Festival, over the weekend. He had just finished performing his song, “Villematic," which reworks Kanye’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy hit, “Devil in a New Dress.” Cole included his take on the beat on his mixtape, Friday Night Lights, which released back in 2010. Despite rare reviews and love from fans, the project still has not made its way to streaming services.

“Shout out to Kanye West,” Cole said on stage after the song finished. “Please clear the sample for me, my brother. I appreciate it.” It would stand to reason that the request implies Cole could be trying to bring Friday Night Lights to streaming services sometime soon. In November 2020, on the mixtape's 10-year anniversary, Cole wrote on Instagram, “My dream is to one day have this on DSP’s where it belongs.”

It might be tough for Cole to get the clearance from Ye, as the two haven't always been on the best of terms. Cole famously dissed West on his 2016 song “False Prophets.” At the time, he rapped: “Justifying that half ass shit he dropped, we always buy it/ When he tell us he a genius but it’s clearer lately/ It’s been hard for him to look into the mirror lately/ There was a time when this n***a was my hero, maybe/ That’s the reason why his fall from grace is hard to take."

West eventually responded to the diss, demanding an apology from Cole on Twitter. “I need a publicly apology from J. Cole and Drake to start with immediately,” he wrote. From there, he added, “I’m Nat Turner … I’m fighting for us. I’m not putting no more music out till I’m done with my contract with Sony and Universal…On God…in Jesus name…come and get me. I have the utmost respect for all brothers … we need to link and respect each other… no more dissing each other on labels we don’t own.” Luckily, the two appeared to be on better terms, last year, when Cole praised Kanye’s jeen-yuhs Netflix docuseries. In doing so, they shared a brief back-and-forth on social media.

[Via]