“Poke It Out” by Wale (ft. J. Cole)

Don’t let the beginning of “Poke It Out” fool you, where Wale commences the track by alluding to the notion that stardom has denied him access to true love. For shortly thereafter, the song effectively transforms into what we may term, based on the chorus in particular, as a twerk song, i.e. an admonishment for the females in the house to “poke it out”, and you know, like jiggle it.

And outside of that, this track basically features the two homies engaged in some hard braggadocio, even asserting that they were poppin’ before blowing up.

So in the midst of the coronavirus and all of the other stuff currently going on in the world, it would appear that mainstream rap hasn’t matured at all. For in this case we even have J. Cole, the rapper most known for his intellectualism, basically bragging about how he’s richer than the rest of us.

But of course, within the context of tracks like “Poke It Out”, the ultimate goal of such boasting would be in the name of impressing sexy ladies while discouraging romantic rivals.

Wale, “Poke It Out” and J. Cole

Wale is a rapper who most notably is a long-standing signee of Rick Ross’s Maybach Music Group. Back during the label’s heyday he dropped a couple of studio LPs, 2013’s The Gifted and 2015’s The Album About Nothing, that topped the Billboard 200. And throughout the years Wale has sorta established himself as a household name, even if not an A lister, in the world of hip-hop.

This song was in fact released by Maybach Music, alongside Warner Records on 22 October 2021. And on that date, it became the third single issued from Folarin II, i.e. Wale’s seventh studio album.

Meanwhile, J. Cole is of course mostly associated with his own label, Dreamville Records, as well as Roc Nation, the latter of whom afforded Jermaine a solid foot in the door early in his career. However, he and Wale are still regular collaborators. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that Wale is from Maryland and Cole, somewhat-nearby North Carolina.

But anyway, according to Genius, “Poke It Out” marks the 12^th time they have teamed up on song, with Wale serving as the lead vocalist on most of those tracks.

The two rappers wrote this song. And it was produced by hip-hop mainstays Cool & Dre. In doing so they sampled 1999’s Vivrant Thing, i.e. the most notable solo track Q-Tip ever dropped. And such is acknowledged even in the song’s music video, which was directed by LCR$.