Kendrick Lamar Gave Ray Vaughn Advice During His Rap Battle With Joey Badass

Key Takeaways

• Kendrick Lamar advised Ray Vaughn to remove ad-libs from his Joey Badass disses, keeping things sharp and intentional.
• Vaughn explained that Top Dawg Entertainment has a “protocol” for releasing tracks, even during active rap beefs.
• The back-and-forth between Vaughn and Joey has cooled, with both artists now focused on upcoming projects.

Ray Vaughn picked up a few pointers from Kendrick Lamar during his ongoing rap beef with Joey Badass. During a Friday (June 6) appearance on “The Bootleg Kev Podcast,” the Long Beach rapper opened up about the behind-the-scenes advice he got from the Pulitzer Prize winner.

"I'm on the phone with [Lamar] when I'm going at Joey, [like], 'Hey, do you f**k with this?'" he shared. "I always get feedback. S**t still don't come out [whenever I want]. It's still got a protocol."

Despite what some might assume, no, Lamar didn’t give Vaughn any lines. "If anything, it's like, ‘Take something out,’" the Top Dawg Entertainment artist explained, noting that it wasn’t about bars or disses, but more about trimming things down. "Like ad-libs." Watch the clip below.

Many fans might say having the "Not Like Us” hitmaker in your corner is somewhat of an unfair advantage, especially after what he did to Drake last year. However, as Ab-Soul and a few others from the West Coast have pointed out, Joey seemingly had his sights set on K. Dot from the start.

Elsewhere in his conversation with Bootleg Kev, Vaughn explained that TDE always has some input on what gets released, especially since tracks go out through the label's official channels. "It's still the way we run TDE. It's still the same thing," he said. "You've got to go down the line...When they post it, it's going on TDE's page. It’s like, ‘N**ga, you speaking, and it’s coming from our side, so make sure that you’re coming correct.’"

Since their back-and-forth started, Vaughn has taken jabs at Joey by way of tracks like “Crashout Heritage,” “H** Era” and “Golden Eye.” The Brooklyn native returned fire across his “Red Bull Spiral Freestyle,” “THE FINALS” and “CRASH DUMMY.”

Things appear to have cooled off lately, especially after Ab-Soul called for the two to keep it a “friendly fade” in a freestyle released back in May. Not to mention, both Vaughn and Joey are working on upcoming projects, and with the 1999 creator expecting a child soon, the beef might stay on pause for a while.