Photo by Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for Anheuser-Busch
The star-studded Creed II soundtrack features “Shea Butter Baby” a steamy collaboration between Dreamville Records artists Ari Lennox and J. Cole. The romantic track is produced by Mike WiLL Made-It, SHROOM, and Dreamville’s Elite.
Speaking to Billboard at the Creed II New York premiere, Lennox explained the sound that she tried to cultivate on the song.
“Elite was doing what he does, producing, and it sounded beautiful,“ she said. "I was just going for Missy Elliott mixed with Raphael Saadiq vibes, and it all worked out and Cole hopped on it about a month ago and changed my life again. It sounds great and he absolutely killed it.”
On the track’s first verse, Lennox sings about a romantic rendez-vous:
Touch me, take me, kiss me
Love me, impress me
Pull up, black truck, ganja
Wrist so blinding, heart so timeless
In his verse, Cole compares his infatuation to drug addiction, rapping:
You crossed my mind a thousand times
The cost was fine, I draw the line
I’m back, relapse, I’m fiending
Yes, what’s that? In fact, I’m dreaming
Lennox contributed vocals to “Change” off Cole’s 4 Your Eyez Only. She told Billboard that she sees “Shea Butter Baby” as their first “full” collaboration.
“He’s always changed my life and he’s always looking out, but this is the first time we have a full collaboration and we’re both killing it together,” she explained. “[‘Change’] was like me being a sweet bird in the background. In this song, we’re killing it together.”
Cole has experience working with both Saadiq and Missy. He and Saadiq teamed to produce a remix of A Tribe Called Quest’s “Can I Kick It?” while Missy guested on his track “Nobody’s Perfect.”
In 2017, Ari Lennox appeared on Genius' series Verified to break down her track “Backseat.”
Read the full lyrics to “Shea Butter Baby” and the rest of Creed II: The Album on Genius now.
