The ‘Kill Bill’ singer will be performing at the Super Bowl halftime show with Lamar. Nearly 16 years ago, SZA dated her friend Kendrick Lamar’s now arch-rival, Drake. But, it was just a fling. The two friends have previously collaborated on multiple songs, including “Babylon,” which was on SZA’s 2014 EP, Z, and “All The Stars” from the soundtrack of the 2018 film, Black Panther. Although SZA’s spending a lot of time with Kendrick in 2025, she’s had both a working and semi-romantic relationship with Drake, born Aubrey Drake Graham.
Here’s everything we know about SZA’s 2009 fling with the Canadian rapper, years before his feud with Lamar. In Drake’s 2020 song, “Mr. Right Now” with Metro Boomin and 21 Savage, he revealed that he once had a relationship with SZA, whose real name is Solána Imani Rowe. “Yeah, said she wanna f*** to some SZA, wait / 'Cause I used to date SZA back in '08,” he sang. SZA didn’t hesitate to respond to this tune, as she later made some clarifications about when the brief romance happened.
According to the “Kill Bill” singer, her 2009 relationship with Drake was never that serious. “It’s never been weird. It didn’t come completely out of the blue when he let me know,” she said, referring to the romance being mentioned in “Mr. Right Now.” “I didn’t know it was a song with 21 [Savage] or anything like that. But anytime he’s ever mentioned me, it’s always been positive. He’s never said anything negative about me. I’m grateful for that. I think highly of him… He’s King Drake.”.
The two musicians have worked together before, as they collaborated on the 2023 tune, “Sline You Out,” from Drake’s album, For All the Dogs. SZA was also featured in another song on that album, “Rich Baby Daddy.”. Just a few days later and before Drake had properly responded, Lamar dropped another incendiary track, “6:16 in LA”, on his Instagram. It said the company and streaming giant Spotify “have a long-standing, symbiotic business relationship” and alleges that UMG offered special licensing rates to Spotify for the song. The petition also accused UMG of firing employees seen as loyal to Drake “in an apparent effort to conceal its schemes”.
