Drake to bring rap battles straight to your home, partners with Caffeine for a new streaming project
Canadian rapper Drake has announced partnering with the social broadcasting platform 'Caffeine' to add rap battles to its roster of entertainment. The artist released this information on his Twitter on February 11.
The 'Nice for What' rapper has been noted as having a particular fondness for battle rap and wants Ultimate Rap League to be accessible for fans. In 2018, he expressed his love for the art, telling LeBron James, “I study rap battles for a living,” while admitting that he lost a beef with Pusha T. The artist has already made an appearance at a 2015 rap battle event where he was challenged to a battle by Murda Mook, but Drake declined the offer.
In the recent Tweet, he comments, "Excited to announce this major step forward!! I managed to get @urltv and @caffeine linked up with the objective of making battle rap easier to access in your home or on your mobile device and it’s FREE to watch battles once you sign up (sic)", concluding with, "Greatness Simplified."
According to The Verge, Drake has signed a "multi-year" partnership with Caffeine, although he hasn't ceased activity on his own channel at any point. “I’ve always loved URL and admired what Smack and his team have been able to create, it just wasn’t easily accessible,” Drake commented in a statement shared by The Verge. “It’s exciting to be in a position where I’m able to bring Caffeine to the table and help provide URL with the tools they need to elevate the viewing experience and make it more accessible to fans.”
Drake has also dipped his hands in the realm of online streaming before. In 2018, the rapper played the renowned online battle arena game 'Fortnite' along with the famous streamer Ninja on Twitch and had over 600,000 viewers. Caffeine's CEO Ben Keighran told CNN, "Drake! If you look at his career in the last ten years, it is defined as the biggest artist in the world."
He further added saying, "This is a guy that can catch the attention of not just the entertainment world, but the gaming world as well."