Earl Sweatshirt’s Drake ‘Don’t Worry’ moments stir fan debate
Reports linking Earl Sweatshirt and MIKE’s shows to Drake’s “Don’t Worry” have set off fresh arguments over a song critics say works.
By Bianca Rossi · Entertainment Editor
3 min read
Earl Sweatshirt Drake “Don’t Worry” clips have given rap fans a new argument to pick apart. Rolling Stone reported that Sweatshirt had been closing recent sets by singing along karaoke-style to Drake’s track, while a separate account from a Melbourne date describes the recording playing over the venue speakers before and after the show.
Those are related moments, but they are not the same thing. The available reports show “Don’t Worry” became part of the atmosphere around Sweatshirt and MIKE’s recent run, without establishing that Sweatshirt performed it himself at every stop.
Did Earl Sweatshirt sing Drake’s “Don’t Worry” live?
Rolling Stone’s Jeff Ihaza wrote that Sweatshirt had used the song to close recent live sets, with clips circulating from about late May during the Home on the Range Tour with MIKE. Ihaza described Sweatshirt singing along to the track rather than performing a new version of it.
At a late-May Melbourne show, however, To Be Magazine’s Edie Hopgood reported hearing Drake’s original recording through the speakers as the crowd waited for the set and again as the show ended. That firsthand account describes walk-on and exit music, not a live karaoke performance.
MIKE and Sweatshirt were touring in the wake of their collaborative project POMPEII // UTILITY, made with Surf Gang. To Be Magazine described the 33-track release as split between 18 Sweatshirt tracks on UTILITY and 15 MIKE tracks on POMPEII.
Why did the clips turn into a Drake debate?
According to Rolling Stone, the footage hit a fan culture already caught up in the ongoing Kendrick Lamar and Drake arguments that followed their 2024 rap feud. Some viewers took Sweatshirt’s apparent enthusiasm as trolling; others argued it showed Drake had somehow won that broader dispute.
There is a far less complicated reading: the song may have landed because the people in the room liked it. Rolling Stone’s positive assessment is criticism, not a settled fact, but Ihaza argued that “Don’t Worry” succeeds through its catchy melody and tightly focused resentment.
The writer singled out Drake’s unusually mundane details about wanting an opponent to struggle with a phone bill and a light bill. In that view, the specificity gives the song’s grievance a comic, recognizable edge instead of leaving it at generic threats.
That does not identify who, if anyone, Drake had in mind when the track was made. Nor do the reports establish that the song concerns a particular chapter of the 2024 feud. What they do document is a Drake record crossing into an Earl Sweatshirt and MIKE crowd, then becoming fuel for an online fight that was already looking for its next exhibit.
For readers who caught only the viral posts, the clean version is this: “Don’t Worry” was heard at documented shows, reports differ on exactly how Sweatshirt used it, and the song’s quality remains a matter of taste. The clips made that taste very public.
This story draws on original reporting from Rolling Stone.