the potential to be a lucrative collaboration.
“Then finally I was in the studio one night.
I had just got done doing what I was doing,
and [Megan] put this on, saying, ‘Please,
I want you to do this record.’” He hadn’t even
listened to it before that verse came out of his
mouth, fully formed. “The second I heard it,
I’m like, ‘Oh, she coming like this?’” he says.
“I told the engineer, ‘Load it up.’”
DaBaby flashes a satisfied grin. “That
song—I don’t got to rap a word if I turn it on
at my show.”
“I know every word,” I tell him—and so do
my girlfriends. And my guy friends. And a
bouncer wearing Rocawear who I saw really
feeling every syllable and pregnant pause at
a bar in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn. And suburban
teens awkwardly pantomiming every word
on TikTok: And whenever we fuck, she be
fuckin’ me back / Put her in the headlock with
my elbow / Now she done reversed it / Got up
on the dick and ride the shit like a Camaro! If
“Cash Shit” were just sexy, it wouldn’t work as
well. But it’s a record that just happens to be
so utterly direct about its intentions. Enough
bags and jets and “head in a comfortable
bed”! DaBaby just wants to fuck.
This is a side of him that comes out more
often on his records with women, with Megan
Thee Stallion generally being DaBaby’s best
collaborator. With other rappers, he’s taking
over; with her it’s more like a coordinated
dance. There’s no double standard to his
satisfaction. Women are invited to be just as
obscene as he is. “It’s like I make it okay to
be your damn self. You know what I mean?I do it unapologetically, and Meg embodies
the same thing,” he says and quotes his own
first line again: You know why these bitches
love me? ’Cause Baby don’t give a fuck.
“Women are going to lose their voice
screaming it out when I perform this song.
It’s very heartfelt,” he says. “I’m just mak-
ing it okay to just let go and not give a fuck
what nobody thinks.” It’s easy to imagine
women at a DaBaby show tip-tapping out
a text to their boyfriends saying that they’re
not coming home, that they’re about to make
several mistakes, please don’t wait up. (It’s
easy to imagine because I would be one of
those women.)
Where does he think this dexterity—dirty
raps about sex that are fun, not gross—comes
from?
“On ‘Cash Shit,’ it’s hot and playful and
funny—” I begin.
“Right,” he says. “It is...but at the same time
it’s aggressive.” He lets out an over-the-top
sigh. He likes flirting, he likes making women
feel beautiful. But even he is confused by his
own sex appeal: “I’m not sure what exactly
makes it okay when I say the word ‘bitch’ and
what makes it o≠ensive when somebody else
says ‘bitch.’ You get what I’m saying? If I say
‘bitch,’ it may make a female bite their bottom
lip like, Damn, say that to me again.”
Here we are, me and DaBaby and his
dimples, trying to figure out why he’s a rap-
per uniquely adored by women. “I don’t
know,” he says. “I have no idea. I got to ask
you that question.”THE ATTENTION CAME as quickly as he
wanted it, but maybe too quickly for him to
be prepared. He’s still working out how to live
in public, with so many eyes on him. In early
January, DaBaby was arrested in Miami, fol-
lowing an incident at the Dallas/Fort Worth
International Airport. It was an allegation
that sounds ironically babyish: TMZ reported
that DaBaby allegedly robbed a concert pro-
moter he felt had shorted him $10,000. The
rapper was accused by the promoter in a
court filing of taking $80, a credit card, and
the man’s iPhone before dousing the guy with
apple juice. He denied that he was involved in
the fight.
“Please stop talking to me about that weak
ass 48 hours I spent in jail and that failed
attempt to break my spirits & interrupt the
path,” he wrote on Instagram following his
release. “Don’t allow yourself to be used by
janky promoters and lazy ass grown men itch-
ing for the opportunity to file a lawsuit that
they won’t win.” There have been other inci-
dents: Days before Miami, Charlotte police
cited DaBaby for marijuana; in November
2018 he was involved in an altercation inside
a Walmart that resulted in a man being
shot and killed. No charges were filed, but
he was eventually (continued on page 94 )