Is Drake’s “Search & Rescue” a Hit or a Played Out Kanye Diss?

Remember 2017’s disastrous Fyre Festival that was more like an episode of Survivor than a luxury music experience? 4 years in jail either made the fraudster creator more delusional or gave him a bad sense of humor as he announced Fyre Festival II. Warn your friends and tell your enemies. In other news today:

• Billboard Hot 100 & sales projections 📈 

• Kanye’s Donda Academy slapped with lawsuit

• Doja Cat quits pop to focus on rap

• Man pleads guilty to Pop Smoke murder and receives 4 years

• Is Drake’s “Search & Rescue” a hit or a corny Kim K bit?

• Industry Insights

Hot 100 Chart & Streams

The above chart shows Billboard’s Hot 100 ranking, as of today, and the corresponding song streams for the week of March 24-31st as reported by Hits Double Daily (streaming weeks follow a Friday to Thursday schedule).

Hot 100 ranks songs based on a combination of streaming activity, radio airplay audience impressions, and sales data—all measured by Luminate. The formula to determine their ranking is unknown but the stream data provides insight into how much of a song’s rank is attributed to radio airplay and sales.

Tyler, the Creator’s “Dogtooth” moves up to #33 this week from his album, CMIYGL: The Estate Sale, which is currently #3 on Billboard’s 200 album chart. The album opened with 70,385 album equivalent sales for its first week.

Sales Projections

NF’s first project in 4 years, HOPE, is projected to debut with 90-110K album equivalent units and Daniel Caesar’s Never Enough is projected to move 25-30K units in its opening week.

Lawsuit Against Kanye’s Donda Academy Reveals Concerning Details

Two former Donda Academy teachers, Cecilia Hailey, and Chekarey Byers, are suing Kanye and his private Christian prep school for wrongful termination. They have been fired allegedly as a reprisal for reporting the school’s code violations.

The lawsuit and interviews with TMZ and Rolling Stone offer a rare look into what actually goes on at the school. According to Byers, the reality is “pure chaos” and revolt—despite the concept sounding great on paper. Find the full details below.

What was already known about Donda Academy?

Rolling Stone’s investigation last year found the academy was not officially recognized or authorized as a school for kindergarten to Grade 12. The principal and executive director hadn’t held previous positions as educators and students and their families had to sign NDA agreements.

How unconventional are the rules and regulations?

The only lunch option is sushi and students aren’t allowed to bring outside food or drink. The Nobu-esque lunch reportedly cost the school $10,000 a week but teachers' paycheques were “untimely or inaccurate” with $1,800 to $2,700 missing per pay period. The campus doesn’t provide janitorial services, security precautions, or a school nurse and medical access.

Classes aren’t allowed to take place on the school’s second floor per Kanye “because he’s afraid of the stairs” and the dress code is all black with jewelry, Nike, and Adidas shoes strictly forbidden. Furthermore, teachers and students aren’t allowed to sit in chairs, they could use foam cushions, and stools or stand throughout the class.

What are the concerns for the students’ future?

Hailey stressed that the students are behind academically compared to the normal progression in an accredited school. Students aren’t graded on their academia which makes transferring to another school almost impossible.

“If they go to another school, they don’t have any transcripts, they have no grades, no report card; they’re not accredited. If they go someplace else, and they get tested and they’re supposed to be in sixth grade but they test on a fourth-grade level,” Hailey also said to Rolling Stone.

For students hoping that Donda Academy will prepare them for a career in the arts and entertainment, Hailey said it’s a “pipe dream” and not a reality without “licensed principals, vice principals, and educators as in normal surroundings, but with the creative component.”

Doja Cat Quits Making Pop Music to Focus on Rap

Doja Cat’s breaking up with pop music for now and is focusing her attention on rap. In a recent Twitter rant, one of her many specialties, she clarified that pop music no longer excites her and addressed the critics that have been challenging her ability to rap.

She also tweeted that she’s quitting music (again) before denying and confirming her resignation as a joke? If rappers made you hate the word “soon” with all their talk of releases that are never in fact, soon, then Doja made me hate the word “quit”.

The forthcoming album, Hellmouth, is rumored to be released this year and in an interview with Variety, Doja said she’s taking a “more masculine direction” than 2021’s Planet Her.

Lil Durk posted an IG story saying “@dojacat rap album” with a screenshot of an audio track suggesting the pair have a collab in the works. For obvious reasons, I take Doja’s tweets with a grain of salt but a full rap album with features might be my favorite Doja project yet.

Man Pleads Guilty in Murder of Pop Smoke & Receives 4 Years

Soon after the trial for the murder of XXXTentacion comes to a close, a defendant in the Pop Smoke case pleads guilty to voluntary manslaughter and home invasion robbery.

The 20-year-old, whose name was withheld from the court because he was a minor at the time of the 2020 murder, was sentenced to 4 years and 2 months behind bars in a juvenile facility. The judge declined to apply the 2 years and 8 months the defendant has already served in a juvenile hall to his sentence.

Still, the single-digit sentence seems light in comparison to the life sentences handed to XXXTentacion’s convicted killers and Tay-K’s 55-year sentence for murder and 30 years for aggravated robbery, despite Tay-K being a minor at the time of his crimes.

What other details are known about the case?

There are 3 more defendants, Corey Walker, Keandre Rodgers, and one unidentified male who is the alleged shooter and was 15 years old at the time. They’re scheduled to appear in an LA courtroom for a pretrial hearing on May 5th.

The defendant who pleaded guilty allegedly scouted the mansion Pop Smoke was staying at and helped Walker recruit the other suspects for the robbery.

Why is the sentence lesser than XXXTentacion’s killers?

X’s killers were found guilty of first-degree murder and armed robbery. First-degree murder implies that you fully intended the kill the other person whereas voluntary manslaughter constitutes behavior that shows you don’t care if someone dies because of your actions.

In Pop Smoke’s case, it seems the defendants planned to rob him but his death was a cause-and-effect of the confrontation that took place when the robbery went wrong. Walker’s lawyer claimed, in a 2021 hearing, that Walker insisted “if it became necessary for the suspects to defend themselves, they should use a flower vase rather than shoot someone.”

Is Drake’s “Search & Rescue” a Hit or a Played-Out Kanye Diss?

Drake’s illustrious career has been peppered with rap beefs that typically result in a salty loss for his enemy and a victory for him. As of late, he’s been relatively quiet on the feud front which is why his latest single, “Search & Rescue”, featuring a controversial clip of Kim Kardashian, feels unnecessarily antagonistic towards one of his longest-running enemies—Kanye West.

Allow me to break down the promotional and lyrical content of the single to decide if its merit lies in the talent of one of the greatest rappers today or the pettiness of his ego.

What was the promotional rollout?

On April 2nd, the single was teased during Drake’s SiriusXM Radio station Sound 42, and the Kim K audio discussing her divorce, “I didn’t come this far, just to come this far and not be happy”, immediately caught fire online—dredging up his past with Kanye.

You could say the audio was a coincidence and simply fit with the theme of the song, Drake crooning about a lover he’s never found despite having dated half the models on Instagram, but it didn’t stop there.

When the song’s release was announced, the album artwork appeared with a woman who looked remarkably similar to Kim (turns out it was a singer named Lilah). The artwork started a whole other side chat about all the possible ways it was directed at Kanye and a photo of him and Kim. Once is a coincidence and twice is calculated.

Yet when the song was released, there was no direct lyrical diss towards Kanye giving Drake, and his father, plausible deniability that the Kim sample and cover art were Kanye-related.

Drake and Kanye’s history

The rumor mill has speculated that the beef between the two rappers was in part due to Drake being intimate with Kim in the past. Kanye squashed this idea in his Drink Champs interview and the duo’s performance for the Free Larry Hover Benefit concert in 2021 suggested they’d finally put the rivalry to rest.

Then came Her Loss and “Circo Loco”. Drake rapped, “Linking with the opps, bitch I did that shit for J. Prince / Bitch I did it for the Mob Ties,” suggesting the ceasefire was temporary.

The Kanye beef is played out, especially when Kanye is disgraced in the eyes of public opinion. It’s like bringing a gun to a knife fight—Drake had already won before “Search & Rescue”. Kanye and Drake beefing at the height of a release or accomplishment (aka the Donda era) will always be popcorn worthy but currently, I’m disinterested.

The use of Kim also feels unoriginal, like Drake was too lazy to find an innovative play in his playbook, and it diminishes the otherwise theoretical sentiment her quote carries.

Is the song actually good?

Without the Kanye narrative, the ominous production by BNYX, Lil Yachty, and others is hard and the lyrics are caption-worthy. It wouldn’t go down as one of Drake’s best songs but it follows his patented formula that’s proved successful time and time again.

However, the subliminal Kanye dig puts “Search & Rescue” in the category of Drake’s diss tracks, and in comparison to others, like 2015’s “Back to Back” which was directed at Meek Mill and nabbed a Grammy nomination, it doesn’t measure up.

A 36-year-old asking for a lover to take him out the club, while taunting another 45-year-old man could be overlooked for its corniness if the bars were so pointed and clever that you felt Kanye’s blood boil but “Seach & Rescue” is not that.

Was “Search & Rescue” headline-worthy? Absolutely, I’m writing about it—Drake accomplished what he set out to do (he has major main character media energy.) Is it something that makes me go “Wow another win for Drake”? No, his performance at Dreamville was more impressive and applaud-worthy than this.

• SZA’s SOS tour grossed $34.5 million in earnings. The 18-date tour averaged 12,812 tickets and $1.9 million per show.

• Fyre Festival II is “finally happening”, says Billy McFarland a year after his prison release. The’s festival first failed run was a rich person’s torture chamber.

• Nicki Minaj wants equity in Amazon’s AMP after NBA YoungBoy lands radio show in a new alleged leaked audio clip.

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