What was supposed to be a placeholder of sorts, to carry us over until his next real album, ended up becoming arguably his most engaging work. He didn’t exactly marry the Drake that picks over failed relationships to the Drake that beats his chest and declares to the world what a big deal he is, but he did bring them closer together, and there’s clearly some irony to the fact that he seemed to do so almost inadvertently, because the quickfire nature of the release meant that he had to focus, and couldn’t indulge his every whim like he had done in the past. Suddenly, he sounded pointed, urgent even, and the confidence he exuded seemed considerably less affected. Until last year, when he released If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late, not quite an album, but meatier than a mixtape. As far as he was concerned, though, it seemed as if the policy was that never the twain should meet, and that he was quite happy with that, thank you very much. You sensed that if he really put his mind to it, Drake could make a record that blended his identities and, in the process, cut away the considerable fat from his full-lengths. These weren’t two wildly different characters – it wasn’t Eminem doling out stony-faced advice to his young daughter one minute and comparing the relative merits of a range of celebrity arses in an uncategorisable accent the next. The frustrating thing is that it was never Jekyll and Hyde stuff. It was always the lack of a throughline that rankled it never felt as if Drake was anywhere close to a substantial reconciliation of these two sides of his musical personality. It really felt like a case of so near yet so far, both times just as either release felt like it was about to hit its atmospheric stride, there’d be a track that punctured it and spoiled the good work – a badly-placed banger after a succession of soul-searches, or a woozy downer stopping a cocky strut dead in its tracks.
Take Care’s title track, built around that fabulous Gil Scott-Heron sample, was a razor-sharp modern love song, and yet it sat on the same record as obvious club staples like “Headlines” and “H.Y.F.R.” Great from a commercial point of view, but it left the album itself – and its follow-up, 2013’s Nothing Was the Same - crying out for cohesion. That, inevitably, made him a record executive’s dream here’s a guy who can have massive singles on both sides of the coin, who can have the confrontational crackle of “Over” come off the same album as the schmaltz of “Find Your Love” – two different flavours of radio smash.Īnd the thing is, when he’s at his best, he can do either, both, in convincing fashion. His first mixtape, So Far Gone, put him amongst a new vanguard in hip hop, one where introspection, not extroversion, was paramount (see also: Kid Cudi’s superlative A Kid Named Cudi.) Drake had hardened a little by the time Thank Me Later, his debut proper, dropped – still thoughtful, but no longer afraid to brag. Is he the archetypal rapper he so clearly thinks he needs to be to keep his head above the hip hop water – the ultra-competitive alpha male who reels off details of wealth, women and status with casual arrogance? Or is he the man trying to drag the genre, kicking and screaming, in another direction entirely, one where emotional literacy is the most valuable currency? He’s been playing at both roles right from the start, and whether you view that as flexibility or indecision probably indicates the regard – or lack thereof – in which you hold his work.įor better or worse, though, that’s always been his calling card.
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