This ability to cross genres and maintain quality endeared him to a much wider audience than he if he’d stuck to just rapping. A Drake co-sign was worth its weight in gold, even if he showed up every collaborator. He did it on his own songs and with his guest spots. By the time he was hitting his stride, Drake was beating most of his contemporaries at both. Rapping or singing, verses or hooks, it didn’t matter. Doing both in tandem gave him the ability to show up on anyone’s song and knock it out of the park. 808s & Heartbreak had only been out for a few months, but Drake was already pushing despondent, singing-infused rap into new territory. The pliability displayed on So Far Gone was just a jumping-off point.
It wasn’t just versatile - it was effortless, as he pivoted between styles. His hybrid of croon-rapping would redefine what was acceptable for rappers to sound like. So Far Gone feels like a truer release than his official debut, Thank Me Later. Sure there’s the undeniable talent, work ethic, beat selection, genius collaborators, and classic videos, but the true key to Drake’s longevity is his versatility.įolks often forget that Drake’s breakout release was a mixtape.
In addition to being one of the most charting artists of all time, Drake has landed as many hit songs for other artists as he has for himself. He’s one of the only true music stars of the new millennium, and in his home country of Canada, he’s probably the most powerful person who’s not an elected official. Pound for pound, he might be the most successful rapper of all time.
(“I never needed none of y’all,” for instance, could be a shot at the former collaborators whose contributions to If You’re Reading This earned Drake accusations of ghostwriting.) That said, chances are good that, whoever it is that Drake is mad at, listeners who are singing along to this song will just fill that mystery in by conjuring the haters in their own lives.Drake has redefined rap’s sound and the way we consume pop music. “I’m getting straight to the point with it,” he raps here, “Need y’all to know that I never needed none of y’all.” The problem for Drake is that, ever since his extended showdown with Meek Mill last summer, every song he writes in which he sounds angry and vengeful is going to seem like it’s about that situation. For my money the song works better without guests: Drake sounds like he’s talking to himself when he says, “I/ can’t/ trust/ no/ fuckin’/ body” and the absence of any other voices here amps up the sense that this is an inward-facing mutter rather than an attempt to intimidate anyone.įor the album closer-bonus track “Hotline Bling” doesn’t count-Drake revisits the brawny state-of-the-union flow he has previously used on statement songs like “ Tuscan Leather” and “ 5AM in Toronto.” It’s the mode he enters when he wants to demonstrate his chops as a rapper while declaring his independence from everyone in his life who would like to think he depends on them. The album version is all Drake-a fact that’s revealed as soon as you hear him say Jay’s line (“They still out to get me/ I don’t get it /I cannot be gotten-that’s a given”) at the top of the second verse. The single version of this song included a verse by Kanye West and a brief appearance from Jay Z. He is mad that this person has ruined the Cheesecake Factory for him by fighting with him there, and once again he has no interest in holding back his pettiness. “Don’t make me take you back to the hood,” he says at one point, which will surely strike some listeners as problematic and cause them to accuse Drake of being a bad boyfriend. Like a lot of songs on Views, “Childs Play” demonstrates in no uncertain terms that Drake is not concerned about being jumped on by bloggers for having politically incorrect feelings about women.
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