“Forever” by Drake, Lil Wayne, Eminem & Kanye West

As with most cyphers or posse cuts, “Forever” is braggadocious in nature. The emcees are given a general theme or perhaps in this case just a single word – “forever” – and then are tasked with expounding on it in their own respective ways. 

This track was also commissioned in the name of being featured on the documentary about Lebron James earlier in his career, who by that time was already solidly on his way to establishing himself as arguably the greatest athlete to go from high school straight to the NBA. So of course, the title would also be meant to point to his dominion. But it isn’t such that the lyrics possess a basketball or athletics’ related motif.

Instead, what we are basically met with is the rappers referring to their own greatest. By this point in time, all with the exception of Drake were already music industry legends – a fact that they go about personally buttressing in this song using their individual styles. 

Drizzy, Em, Yeezy and Weezy

And as for Drizzy, he was solidly on his way up, as evident by him, a relative newcomer, being featured on this track to begin with. His verse does come off as if it were written by someone who is confidently blowing up. He forced his way to be recognized by the industry.

Eminem’s verse is also of particular note, in that he alludes to the fact that he had just come out of what was more or less a multi-year hiatus. 

Yeezy and Weezy also do their things, i.e. boasting while displaying the types of lyrical skills and clever song writing which made them famous.

So basically, as far as cyphers go, it can be said that this one features more prominent emcees than any other in history. Whether or not “Forever” is actually a classic though is a matter of perspective. But it did go on to sell a lot of copies accordingly.

When was “Forever” released?

Being released on 27 August 2009, “Forever” was originally featured on “Music Inspired by More than a Game”. FYI, More than a Game is basically a documentary about Lebron James’s high school years. 

Later that year, the song also made its way onto the playlist of “Relapse: Refill”, i.e. the deluxe edition of Eminem’s album “Relapse”.

Music

The music video to this track was directed by one of the legends in that regard, Hype Williams. It was filmed primarily in Miami at a venue known as the Fontainebleau Hotel. That said, it is worth pointing out that Eminem’s segment was not shot in Miami. It was shot in his base city of Detroit.

More Interesting Facts about “Forever”

At the time this song came out, whereas Eminem, Kanye and Wayne were already tenured vets, Drake was not. He was still an up-and-coming artist as far as his music career was concerned. In fact, 2009 was actually Drizzy’s breakthrough year.

“Forever” appeared on a number of different Billboard lists, in the process topping the Hot Rap Songs chart, reaching second place on their Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs list and peaking at number 8 on the Hot 100 proper. 

It also proceeded, in less than a decade, to achieve sextuple-platinum status via the RIAA. And whereas this track did not perform particularly well on the global market, it did eventually go platinum in the UK and surpassed 400,000,000 Spotify streams as recently as 2022.

This song was produced exclusively by Boi-1da. As the story goes, it was originally used on a Kardinall Offishall track titled “Bring It Back” that never officially saw the light of day. Later in 2008, Lil Wayne got hold of it and utilized it on one of his own songs called “I Want This Forever”, which does feature Drake (as well as Kidd Kidd, who was also running with Young Money at the time). And by the looks of things, that piece was never officially dropped either. But “Forever” is classified as a remix of “I Want This Forever”.

As far as the credited writers of this track go, that would be the four vocalists in addition to Boi-1da.

One of the most interesting things about this song is the fact that after hearing Eminem’s verse to this song, Kanye was compelled to go back and rewrite his own. But why? Simply because Kanye felt the sheer fire in Em’s verse made his original work look bad.