Drake In Dada Drake Lean — Drake wearing DADA tracksuit doing a lean pose in a mansion with Rick Ross

Drake In Dada Drake Lean

2013photoshop memeclassic

Published August 17, 2026

Drake In Dada Drake Lean is a 2013 photoshop meme built from a leaked behind-the-scenes shot of Drake in a Damani Dada short suit, slouching sideways on the set of his 'No New Friends' music video. Hip hop forums cut out his leaning figure and dropped it into unrelated scenes for about a week in May 2013, and Drake himself joined in by reposting an edit to Instagram.

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Overview

Drake In Dada Drake Lean is a photoshop meme built around a leaked behind-the-scenes shot of Canadian rapper Drake wearing a Damani Dada short suit while leaning to one side on the set of his 'No New Friends' music video1. The image drew instant attention for two reasons: the throwback Dada gear, an athletic apparel brand mostly associated with 1990s hip hop, and Drake's exaggerated slouching pose4.

Editors on hip hop message boards started remixing the image within hours, pasting Drake's leaning silhouette into other scenes and swapping backgrounds, and the format took over rap Twitter for about a week in May 20132. The cut-out pose is what most people mean when they reference the 'Drake Lean' today.

Origin & Background

Platform
The Coli forum (source thread) / Twitter (viral spread)
Date
2013

On May 15th, 2013, behind-the-scenes photos from Drake's 'No New Friends' video shoot leaked to music blogs, including one showing the rapper mid-lean in a Dada short suit1. Fans on Twitter and rap forums immediately started dunking on the outfit. That same day, a user on The Coli opened a thread titled 'Come in and remix the Drake Dada picture,' which filled up with photoshopped versions within hours and set the format for what people started calling the Drake Lean4.

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How It Spread

The remix thread jumped forums fast. On May 18th, Boxden's hip hop board launched its own Drake in Dada photoshop thread that hit 23 pages of replies inside 48 hours4. On May 19th, Hip Hop Stan and Kanye To The both started matching threads, and the tag 'Drake photoshop' was tweeted more than 20,000 times that day per Topsy Analytics3.

By May 20th, coverage jumped from forums to blogs, with Uproxx calling it the greatest hip-hop-related meme of all time2 and Rolling Out, The Source, and MTV RapFix all rounding up the best edits5. Drake himself co-signed the joke that afternoon, reposting a Coli edit to his Instagram account, where it pulled over 135,000 likes and 5,600 comments within seven hours6.

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How to Use This Meme

The template typically starts with the cut-out of Drake in the Dada short suit, leaning to the left with his hands at his sides. Editors usually drop him into unrelated backgrounds such as historical photos, movie stills, or other rappers' album covers so the lean lines up with something else in frame5. Captions are optional; the joke is often carried by the pose itself and how naturally it fits the new scene.

Frequently Asked Questions