Drake looks set to take another L in his rivalry with Kendrick Lamar thanks to the somewhat underwhelming commercial performance of his new album $ome $exy $ongs 4 U.
Drizzy’s first full-length release since suffering defeat in his rap battle with Kendrick last year, the project — a collaboration with PARTYNEXTDOOR — is on track to earn around 250,000 equivalent units in its first week, according to HITS Daily Double.
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The album is expected debut at number one on the Billboard 200, earning the 6 God his 14th chart-topper — putting him level with JAY-Z and five behind record-holders The Beatles — and PARTY his first.
However, the project would also be the fifth lowest-selling of Drake’s career (based on first-week sales) behind So Far Gone (73,000), Care Package (109,000), Honestly Nevermind (204,000) and Dark Lane Demo Tapes (223,000).
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To add insult to injury, $ome $exy $ongs 4 U would fall short of Kendrick’s own post-beef album GNX, which opened with 319,000 units last November.
Drake’s supporters may argue that this technically isn’t his first solo offering since the feud and it has lacked the same budget and marketing push as his previous projects due to it being released through OVO and Santa Anna as opposed to Universal Music Group, as Audiomack’s Brian Zisook pointed out.
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As a consolation, Drizzy will likely dethrone Kendrick at the top of the Billboard 200 after GNX returned to number one earlier this week, thanks to a surge in streams after his Super Bowl halftime show and sales of physical copies.
GNX will instead compete with Sabrina Carpenter’s Short n’ Sweet (Deluxe) for the number two spot with an estimated 147,000 units.
US albums chart preview (via @HITSDD):
#1 @partynextdoor & @Drake 250K
#2 Sabrina Carpenter (@SabrinaAnnLynn) 149K
#3 @kendricklamar 147K
#4 @SZA 93K
#5 Bad Bunny (@sanbenito) 67K
#6 @theweeknd 62K
#7 @ChappellRoan 50K
#8 @billieeilish 44K
#9 @MorganWallen 40k
#10 Kendrick…— chart data (@chartdata) February 18, 2025
Despite its middling sales projections, $ome $exy $ongs 4 U did make an immediate splash on streaming.
On Spotify, it earned 56.6 million first-day streams, which is the second biggest debut of the year so far behind The Weeknd‘s Hurry Up Tomorrow.
Over on Apple Music, the project broke the all-time record for the biggest single-day streams for an R&B album.
$ome $exy $ongs 4 U also helped Drake temporarily eclipse Kendrick for the most single-day Spotify streams by a rapper this year with 92.4 million.
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On the project itself, Drizzy appeared to reference his beef with Kendrick while also taking a shot at his longtime frenemy Joe Budden.
