Coachella—those annual weekends when molly is sprinkled on the pages of Us Weekly and an H&M catalog, causing them to magically come alive and wander the California desert as music plays faintly in the background—has already produced its breakout moment, which naturally has nothing to do with music. It happened last night during Drake’s headlining slot, as he closed the festival with a set composed mostly of moody, self-reflective bummers (Drake songs). After playing “Madonna,” from his recent If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late, he then yielded the stage to a surprise guest, the human embodiment of his music’s aura of morning-after regret: Madonna herself.


Wearing a shirt that quoted Drake’s lyric, “BIG AS MADONNA” (which you can get yourself for a mere $52, or trip to Hobby Lobby), Madonna performed her own “Human Nature,” “Express Yourself,” and “Hung Up,” all while Drake watched politely from a chair. And then she rewarded his patience with a kiss. A kiss that poets will one day vie to sing of—like that between Cupid and Psyche, or you and your drunken aunt, that one terrible Thanksgiving.

Naturally, the Internet immediately set to debating what had happened to make Drake react with more dramatic fervor than he ever displayed on Degrassi, even when he was shot. Had she bitten his tongue in the sexy, playful way of mating skinks? Accidentally dropped her Ricola into his windpipe? Regurgitated a slurry of vitamins and vodka into him like a baby bird? Or as the many people in Buzzfeed’s social media round-up suggested, was this kiss—the most romantic of its kind since Harry Potter met the Dementor—just the latest refueling in a long history of Madonna preying upon younger pop stars, absorbing a bit of their cultural lifeforce for herself?




Whatever actually passed between them, Drake laughed it off for the crowd: “Oh shit, what the fuck just happened?” he said, already disoriented and missing time. Perhaps if it studies the evidence enough, one day the scientific community can tell us.




UPDATE: In an effort to ensure that this display of being suffocated, then visibly repulsed, by her desperate affections doesn’t end up being embarrassing for Madonna, Drake has reportedly asked his representatives to clarify the totally-not-staged exhibition for TMZ. “Sources close to” Drake say he “loved the kiss”—it was the aftertaste of Madonna’s “nude or beige” or completely invisible lipstick that he found objectionable, as its bouquet of wormwood and deadly nightshade worked its way into his system. Of course, Drake didn’t make these statements himself, presumably as his throat is currently busy forming a cocoon.