J. Cole and Bas are gearing up to collaborate once again, giving fans a sneak peek at their upcoming single, Passport Bros.
On Saturday (July 15), Bas took to Twitter to post the cover art which shows both himself and Cole sitting on the same couch, in relaxed clothing, as if they’re getting ready to take a trip.
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“Passports Bros ft. @JColeNC 7/19 @Dreamville,” Bas tweeted. “We Only Talk About Real Shit When We’re Fucked Up — album coming soon.”
It’s unclear if they’re dropping just one lone single or a full offering on July 19, but regardless, fans will be elated to hear new music from the Dreamville duo.
J. Cole and Bas have collaborated dozens of time on records including 2013’s “New York Times,” 2018’s “Tribe,” and 2021’s “l e t . g o . m y . h a n d.”
Meanwhile, Drake recently showed J. Cole love and dubbed him one of the G.O.A.T.’s of rap “[He’s] one of the greatest rappers to ever touch a microphone,” the OVO boss said before introducing the North Carolina rapper at his show in Montreal, Canada on Friday (July 14). “I hope you enjoy yourself.”
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As for Bas, in a 2021 interview with HipHopDX, he discussed how J. Cole has been a source of influence throughout his career.
“Cole makes me want to work harder,” he told DX at the time. “That’s for sure. You know? Just how dedicated he still remains to his craft, as someone who’s achieved what most of us want and aspire to. You know, levels we all aspire to get to. He’s reached it in this field.”
“I got to work with him on the Off-Season and just seeing his work ethic and his commitment to working on his craft every day. I’m like, ‘Man, it’ll definitely make you feel like you’ve been slacking.’”
Bas also discussed how music became a saving grace in his life at one point in time. “I was getting in trouble a bit,” he explained. “I was in this phase of life, where I had dropped out of school, and I was just doing all the wrong things. So my [younger] brother DJ Moma gave me his MacBook. He was DJ-ing all over New York, and he was like, ‘Just start opening up my gigs for me.’ He’s always been playing me records, since I was a kid.”
He continued: “So I started DJ-ing around New York for a year and then with that same laptop … one of my homie’s convinced me at an afterparty to just put on GarageBand, and we did a track. It might’ve been 11 of us on the song. The song was 15 minutes long. We wouldn’t even stop to edit it; it was just a continuous recording. You hear dudes cracking and rolling up weed on the record. We were just having some fun with it.
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“We were like, ‘Man, this is kind of tight.’ I think it just hit me. Up until that point, I had never had any creative outlet or creative form of expression. I think I didn’t realize how addictive it is to have something like that in your life and how important it is to have that in your life. It gave me discipline. For the first time in life, I had something that I really, really wanted to learn and get better at.”
He concluded: “It just disciplined me to get up, and work on my craft every day. You know what I mean? Go to the studio. Right? Music definitely gave me that at a time when I really needed it.”
