Who Really Started The “Drip” Trend In 2018? | Genius News - YouTube

JACQUES: Deciphering the creator of a slang term is not easy and that couldn’t be any

truer when it comes to “drip.”

JACQUES: Drip has many meanings - one describes being covered in jewelry.

Check out an early instance from Staten Island’s Ghostface Killah on 2000's “Nutmeg.”

JACQUES: Over the last few years, “Drip” has had a renaissance of sorts.

According to Genius data, “drip's" mentions have tripled since 2016.

LIL BABY: If you swaggy, you saucy, you drippin’ that whole little lingo.

JACQUES: But who is the first rapper to really own the "drip?"

JACQUES: H-Town’s Sauce Walka and his crew, The Sauce Family, have used "drip" as

a derivative of "sauce" since at least 2014’s mixtape ‘Saucemania.’

JACQUES: Genius was able to speak to Walka. And for him and his partners,

"sauce" and "drippin" are more than just terms, they’re a way of life.

SAUCE WALKA: We don’t believe in Christianity, we don’t believe in none of that we believe

in the sauce bro.

JACQUES: For The Sauce Family, “drip” is more than just how you dress.

SAUCE: To drip is to be a king.

To drip is to be a winner.

JACQUES: Yes, artists have used "sauce" in this context in the past - notably the

late Mac Dre from the Bay and Atlanta’s J. Money.

JACQUES: But Walka localized it to Houston.

SAUCE: My city always had the ingredients

JACQUES: Sauce incorporated different parts of Houston’s culture into the “drip,”

like Lil Keke & DJ Screw’s 1996 cut, “Pimp Tha Pen...”

JACQUES: ...their love of classic cars...

SAUCE: WHAT DOES CANDY PAINT DO OFF THE SLAB?

INTERVIEWER: Drips.

SAUCE: IT FUCKING DRIPS

JACQUES: And the city’s problematic relationship with promethazine cough syrup and soda

known as lean, which preceded a drip wave

that appeared on TSF mixtapes like 2015’s 'Drip or Drown Vol. 1 & 2.'

JACQUES: But staking out the claim for who made ‘drip’ famous is where things get contentious.

For example, some point to Famous Dex’s 2015 breakout track, “Drip From My Walk.”

JACQUES: But even Dex credits Sauce for the inspiration.

DEX: No more drip it’s Dexter.

You can miss me with the statement. You fuckin’ gon’ get blocked if you hit me with the drip.

Leave that to Sauce Walka that’s the holy sauce. Leave it to him.

JACQUES: In the years that followed, there were many other high profile uses of "drip."

JACQUES: And many rappers have taken credit for breaking the term.

From Atlanta’s Gunna and his 'Drip Season 1-3' which started in 2016

with 'Drip or Drown' a year later.

GUNNA: It's getting big like I want it to, it's just spreading out everybody saying like

on it, everybody who dripping they dripping now.

It’s cool it's what i want it.

JACQUES: ...to Migos’ Quavo…

QUAVO: A lot of our words travel across the world.

INTERVIEWER: Drip!

QUAVO: And a lot of our dance moves.

Yea, drip!

JACQUES: Even WWE wrestler Ric Flair!

RIC FLAIR: Oh yea, check all that drip out.

Ric Flair drip. You lookin' at all...

That's right, I’m responsible for drip. You can ask anybody.

JACQUES: Sauce has addressed the idea that

people are biting him on his projects and lyrics.

JACQUES: He even responded directly to Ric Flair.

SAUCE: Ric Flair man let me tell you something, brotha!

You ain’t start with no drip splash or nothing that gots to do with the slicka dash.

But since you did that now I’m on your ass!

JACQUES: It’s unclear whether or not Ric Flair knew of Sauce Walka when claiming "drip"

but The Migos did collaborate with Sauce on 2015’s “On Top” off of Walka’s 'Sauce Theft Auto.'

JACQUES: And Gunna may have acknowledged the origins of the term in a May 2018 track with

the Sauce Family’s Sosamann.

JACQUES: But in October 2018, Gunna tweeted that he did not care who created the term

and that it was him who made it popular and to that Sauce Walka has a simple response.

SAUCE: That’s like saying I’m a Christian but I don’t give a fuck about Jesus Christ.

What?!

JACQUES: Even though Sauce Walka may have been the first rapper to culturally make "drip"

his thing, the charts show it was Offset’s “Ric Flair Drip” and Gunna & Lil Baby’s

“Drip Too Hard” that reached the Billboard Hot 100 in March 2018 and October 2018 respectively.

JACQUES: At the end of the day, slang travels and you can almost never predict where it

will end up.

JACQUES: I’m Jacques Morel with Genius News, bringing you the meaning and the drip

behind the music.

Peace!