Skillibeng, Fivio Foreign Can’t Agree On Who Contacted Whom For Their Collab

Dancehall artist Skillibeng teamed up with American rapper Fivio Foreign on the newest remix of Whap Whap earlier this month, but both artists are claiming that the other person was first to reach out to them for the collaboration.

According to the City Of Gods rapper, the Jamaican deejay and his team requested him on the gunplay track because their lyrical content was similar.

“What happened is, Skillibeng, the content of his music is similar to the content of my music. So, his people reached out,” the rapper told Hot 97’s Michael Medium—before hitting the Summer Jam 2022 stage with Skillibeng and others on June 12.

“And it was like, yo ‘I wanted like the hottest artist in New York on the song’, so he reached out to me,” Fivio reiterated.

However, the Mr. Universe deejay completely counteracted that statement during a June 27 sitdown down with Apple Music 1’s Ebro Darden.  Skilli claimed that both Fivio and French Montana, the track’s other collaborator, reached out to him first.

“Fivio hit us up, French hit me up and it was two separate remixes at first. And he was like, ‘no, we not going to release remix first and then release’… Because it would have to been Fivio releasing it, then French releasing it, but I don’t know what’s the setup on their releases and stuff like that,” he said.

“But we got the remixes ready, so we just shot a whole video for everything and put all the tracks together, the Fivio and the French, make one remix. And that’s how we doing it right now,” he added.

The Whap Whap (Remix) with Fivio and French Montana was released on June 3, with a Shomi Patwary-directed music video following on June 7, which has so far captured over 2.6 million views on YouTube.  The original single Whap Whap featured F.S., and appears on Skillibeng’s Mr. Universe EP.

Fivio, whose real name is Maxie Lee Ryles III, is signed to Mase’s RichFish Records and Columbia Records.  He rose to fame in 2019 with his single Big Drip, which spawned a remix with rappers Lil Baby and Quavo.  In 2020, he was featured on Drake’s song Demons, which earned him his first Billboard Hot 100 entry.

In August 2021, he got further recognition for his feature on Kanye West’s Off The Grid, off the Donda album.  He and West collaborated again in February 2022 on City Of Gods, which appeared on Foreign’s B.I.B.L.E. album.

Skillibeng, whose real name is Emwah Warmington, is signed to Eastsyde Records and RCA Records. He got his big break with the hit song Brik Pan Brik in 2019, and followed up with other popular tracks, among them Mr. Universe  and  Torpedo .

Skilli’s biggest hit so far is his original Crocodile Teeth, which was later remixed by Nicki Minaj.  The remix debuted at No. 100 on the Hot 100.