Two years ago, Kanye West tapped Jay-Z and DaBaby to add verses to his “Jail” track off the Donda album. Some listeners believe DaBaby actually outrapped Hip-Hop legend Jay-Z on the song.
For example, Lil Yachty picked DaBaby’s “Jail” bars over the Brooklyn-bred MC’s bars. The A Safe Place Podcast host spoke about the lyrical competition on his show in July.
“Something I’ve wanted to talk about for a long time is the song ‘Jail’ from Kanye West,” Lil Yachty said at the time. “In my personal opinion, I think DaBaby had a better verse.”
He also added, “I know the conversation of Jay-Z versus DaBaby is insane, but I honestly think his verse was better. I feel that’s gonna get me a lot of heat anyway. Maybe not as heated as the whole Biggie situation I dealt with in 2016.”
DaBaby has now spoken about the debate over Kanye West’s “Jail” collaboration. The North Carolina native appeared as a guest on Shannon Sharpe’s Club Shay Shay podcast.
“[Lil Yachty] said your verse on ‘Jail’ was better than Hov’s,” Shannon Sharpe told his guest on the November 15th episode of Club Shay Shay. The “Shake Sumn” rapper responded, “It was. You heard both of them?”
DaBaby continued, “Jay-Z, I ain’t got nothing but respect for you. Was your verse better than mine? Come on, OG. It wasn’t. That’s okay… We ain’t do it at the same time. It ain’t like you had the ability to be able to say, ‘Hold on, [let me do it over].’ We did it in two different times. But definitely.”
In addition, DaBaby went on to say the end goal of a collaboration is to make the best song possible. However, the Baby on Baby 2 album creator also admitted that the competitive nature of rap kicks in. He insisted that when a rapper is on a track with “the best” they have to “come with your best.”