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J. Cole is celebrating his 41st birthday by reassuring fans he lost his beef with Kendrick Lamar and Drake on purpose. Yesterday evening, he tweeted out a link to BIRTHDAY BLIZZARD ‘26 a quartet of freestyles over classic hip-hop beats including “Who Shot Ya?” by The Notorious B.I.G. and “Victory” by Diddy (the last song Biggie recorded before his murder). While it’s possible these tracks make their way onto streaming, the iconic instrumentals suggest fans shouldn’t hold their breath: the freestyles are currently available via Cole’s website for a minimum of $1, though the website uses the phrase “pay what you want.”
Hosted by DJ Clue, the new songs find Cole grappling with the fallout from last year’s war of words, from allegations he fell off to the use of rap beef as an album marketing tool (By the way, J. Cole’s next album The Fall Off is out February 6). This seems to have activated sleeper cells of Dreamville stans and October’s Very Own merch owners online, eager to spin Cole’s bars as proof of a grand 4-D chess plan stretching back to last year’s beef (unbelievable) or evidence that Cole is somehow dissing Kendrick Lamar (suicidal).
The new freestyles generally adopt a braggadocious posture: on the first song alone, Cole compares himself to Fabolous, Jesus, Biggie, and Charleston White, in that order. Thematically, BIRTHDAY BLIZZARD ‘26 hones in on questioning the authenticity of other artists’ streaming numbers in the face of lackluster tour sales and reemphasizing Cole’s lyrical prowess. In a bid to showcase Cole’s technical skills, these freestyles lean heavily on assonance to develop internal rhyme schemes. This heightens the momentum of Cole’s raps and emphasizes the density of his lyrics, but occasionally steers his flow into more monotonous territory by repeating the same rhythms.
The 12 most memorable lines on BIRTHDAY BLIZZARD ‘26
“BRONX ZOO FREESTYLE”
- "Somewhere 'long the way, I hate to say we lost shame / Grown men peddlin' gossip of all things / I remеmber when it was rappin' and ball-playin’ / Now the bread and butter is yappin' and parlayin’"
- “Some niggas threw some hate my way / But only thing they should say is, ‘Cole, you like a father to me’'"
- “The top ain't really what I thought it would be / And so I jumped off and landed back at the bottom / And restarted at a level where I wasn't regarded as much / Just to climb past them again and tell 'em all to keep up”
“GOLDEN GOOSE FREESTYLE”
- “Lotta rappers make dough, then be prone to lose it / For crumbs, dumb n***as sold their soul to Lucian / Universal distribution, but I own the music”
- “If the streams say you're winnin’, why your tours is losin’ ? / When the math ain’t mathin’, of course you’re juicin’ / That mean the bots is boostin’”
- “I stay in my lane, despite every bit of dirt thrown my way /There’ll never be a stain on my name, it’s why I walk around / Doley as if ain’t nothin' changed”
“WINTER STORM FREESTYLE”
- “They tryna keep up with your boy, hardly / Bitch, I feel like Lori Harvey how I ran through them n***as”
- “Memes say I'm humble, but trust this humility's / From witnessin' violence and turned off utilities / No man that's rhymin' can match my fluidity”
“99 BUILD FREESTYLE”
- “At one time, my neck and wrist was havin' so much ice / You'd think I'm gettin' dudes deported to a borderin' turf”
- “If life is truly a movie, God is the art department”
- “The rap game, that's been overcome / With loads of marketin' plans / Based on randomly dissin' and hatin' on the next man”
