J.Cole’s “Snow on the bluff’ received mixed responses, as many thought he was dissing 28-year-old artist Noname.
What We Know:
- J.Cole released his first song of 2020 “Snow on the bluff”. The song surprisingly dropped Tuesday night in response to the Black Lives Matter protests. Cole expressed that the song was to express how he as a celebrity should best use his voice.
- Cole’s lyrics read: “My IQ is average, there’s a young lady out there, she way smarter than me / I scrolled through her timeline in these wild times, and I started to read / She mad at these crackers, she mad at these capitalists, mad at these murder police.” Cole, 35, continues, “She mad at my n - - - - s, she mad at our ignorance, she wear her heart on her sleeve / She mad at the celebrities, low-key I be thinkin’ she talkin’ ’bout me.”
- As fans listened to the new track, many began to speculate that Cole’s lyrics were aimed at Chicago based artist Noname. Many applauded the song saying they understood Cole’s perspective. Others began to criticize J.Cole, stating that he is neglecting her freedom of expression.
JCole told one black woman that he agree with her message just her tone be off. I cant stand when ppl say one thing to one person and and they label for the whole race. It on his new song Snow on the bluff.
— Loc.n.Love_Fay♒ (@locNloveFAY) June 17, 2020
the more I let go of my JCole Bias the more I realize that snow on the bluff reminds me a lottt of a man complaining about a woman’s freedom of speech. 🤦🏾♀️the educated, should educate my n***a. Including (ESPECIALLY) Woman
— Emilya Guerrero (@GuerreroEmilya) June 17, 2020
- Noname is known to use her social media platforms to heavily promote “radical unity”, activism, and anti-racism. Recently, Noname stated her opinion on rappers’ use of their platforms, saying in delete tweets, “N - - - - s whole discographies be about black plight and they no where to be found.” Many believed that this tweet was aimed at J.Cole who was recently spotted at a North Carolina protest.
- Noname responded to Cole with “Song 33” stating the lyrics, “He really bout to write about me / When the world is in smokes?” Noname continues with, “When it’s people in trees? / When George begging for his mother saying he couldn’t breathe / You thought to write about me?”
- Artist Chance The Rapper also chimed in, critiquing Cole on his actions “Yet another L for men masking patriarchy and gaslighting as contructive criticism.” He followed that up with, “They both my peoples but only one of them put out a whole song talking about how the other needs to reconsider their tone and attitude in order to save the world. It’s not constructive and undermines all the work Noname has done. It’s not [Black women’s] job to spoon feed us. We grown.”
- J.Cole took to Twitter saying he stands with every lyric he said, but encouraged that he and Noname be gentle to each other.
Morning. I stand behind every word of the song that dropped last night.
— J. Cole (@JColeNC) June 17, 2020
J.Cole and Noname’s disagreement shows that even though we as individuals disagree, we must acknowledge our contrasts and except that we are different.
