YNW Melly was propped up as a punch line on Kendrick Lamar's now-viral "Euphoria" Drake diss track, which the incarcerated rap star considers quite the backhanded compliment.
Midway through the track, Kendrick references the "Murder on My Mind" rapper, and his ongoing double homicide case ... where he stands accused of killing his two friends Chris "YNW Juvy" Thomas and Anthony "YNW Sakchaser" Williams.
Kendrick raps, "Yeah, Cole and Aubrey know I’m selfish/ The crown is heavy I pray they my real friends/ But if not, I’m YNW Melly."
You can understand the uneasy spotlight K. Dot put Melly in, and he tells TMZ Hip Hop, "Kendrick Lamar is one of my favorite rappers so I feel honored and appalled ... I'm a household name -- just for the wrong s**t!!!"
Melly has other hurdles to climb outside of rap lyric annotations -- he was in court last week in Broward County for his double murder retrial, which is currently on ice until further notice.
The judge in the case is forbidding the jury from seeing a recently produced doc on Melly's life. Ya gotta wonder if the judge will put a similar ban on Kendrick's "Euphoria."
We covered it all on the latest episode of The TMZ Podcast, available on all podcast platforms.