Diddy isn’t taking sides in the Kanye West vs. Drake feud after both rappers respectively dropped their highly anticipated albums Donda and Certified Lover Boy.
While both MCs have been spitting their truth and at times taking shots at one another, Diddy took the time to sing both of their praises while enjoying himself — and their music — on a boat and sharing what this moment means to the hip-hop genre as a whole.
“I had a chance to listen to both of these albums and first of all, I just wanna say, yo, you guys are true kings of creativity,” Diddy said in an Instagram video that DJ Akademiks posted on Monday (Sept. 6). “Both of you guys are so special and so necessary. … Thank y’all for the inspiration, you know? But I wanna make sure what hip-hop knows is … that’s the reach and the power that we have. And I really wanna take my hat off to these brothers for both sharing their truths.”
‘Ye’s latest LP proved itself to have incredible reach on the Billboard charts this week, as Donda launched at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and had the year’s biggest week for any album, with 309,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending Sept. 2, according to MRC Data. West also lands 23 songs on the Billboard Hot 100, with two reaching the top 10. While the numbers for CLB have yet to come in, that’s not what Diddy argues is the key factor to what determines that these projects are great: It’s all about love.
“Love decrees that they both win, that we win, and artists should keep pushing it to the limit to be the best. Not against another man, [not] just that because there is competition, but the best within yourself,” said Diddy, who legally changed his middle name to Love. “I think that’s why we’re witnessing two greats and enjoying them. I’m having a ball and the music sounds beautiful.”
Watch Diddy talk about Donda and CLB below.
