As if he didn’t have sufficient to cope with amid his beef with Kendrick Lamar (or maybe to distract from it), Drake confirmed up on a remix of parody rapper Snowd4y’s cowl of Plain White T’s “Hey There Delilah,” referred to as “Wah Gwan Delilah,” that has everybody … perplexed? Aggravated? Laughing?
Let’s stroll by way of this collectively, it’s a multitude.
On Monday, a recent remix of “Wah Gwan Delilah” showed up on Snowd4y’s SoundCloud. It had what seemed to be Drake becoming a member of the comic in a sequence of quips about girls and name-checks of Toronto landmarks just like the Yonge-Dundas Sq. mall. (“Wah gwan” is Jamaican patois for “What’s up?” and is widespread within the metropolis, which has lengthy had a large inhabitants of people of Caribbean descent.)
Because the observe unfold, it made its strategy to the Plain White T’s themselves, who posted a video on X and TikTok with the caption “too shocked to talk.” Frontman Tom Higgenson additionally says “it’s loopy that everyone thinks that it’s actual,” seemingly referencing early rumors that Drake’s lyrics had been generated utilizing synthetic intelligence. Higgenson additionally makes a sequence of faces that give off the looks that he simply smelled a fart.
These rumors, although, are doubtless unfaithful. Drake posted the song to his Instagram Story, seemingly confirming its authenticity.
It’s straightforward to see, although, why everybody was confused. AI, as WIRED’s Evy Kwong identified on TikTok Thursday, has change into so prevalent that it has induced folks to query every thing. When the track “Heart on My Sleeve” dropped, it took many individuals a number of listens to appreciate it wasn’t truly Drake and The Weeknd. Many followers in all probability by no means would’ve identified The Beatles’ “Now and Then” wasn’t only a pristine long-lost tape if Paul McCartney hadn’t touted the AI wanted to reserve it. Johnny Cash covers Taylor Swift from past the grave. Examples of AI’s potential to idiot our ears really feel actually limitless.
With the realness of Drake’s presence on “Wah Gwan Delilah” seemingly confirmed, the floodgates opened. Rap Twitter, as Billboard noted, had a subject day “with the principle notion being that after dropping the battle to Kendrick, Drake is now simply dropping it generally” and “leaning into his Toronto-ness” for some picture restore.
Possible, it will have the alternative impact. Whereas Drake Reddit is screaming that it’s satire and if folks don’t get it, “the joke is probably on you,” different swaths of the web stay unable to maintain a straight face—or at the least a non-cringing one. Vulture, in its writeup of the remix, merely mentioned “post-beef Drake cannot be serious.”
