With 15 projects already in his discography and another highly anticipated album dropping soon, Drake has cemented himself as a mainstay in the music industry since 2006 when he released his first mixtape. Since 2021 alone, he’s released two studio albums (“Certified Lover Boy” and “Honestly, Nevermind”) that, even though they weren’t as well-received as past albums, shattered streaming records within days. He also teamed up with 21 Savage in 2022 for joint album “Her Loss,” which was another huge commercial success. Currently, he’s on his “It’s All A Blur” Tour, performing all of these recent projects live for the first time and electrifying the crowd with classic hits, futuristic visuals and surprise celebrity guests.
In August, Drake teased fans with the cover art—designed by his son, Adonis—for his upcoming studio album titled “For All The Dogs.” Fans misinterpreted the announcement and thought the album would drop on Friday, August 25, but were disappointed to find that nothing was released.
What the situation lacked in new music it made up for with a profound revelation: even after all of these years, Drake has the power to captivate an entire fanbase with the smallest hint of an album release.
No matter how easy it is for people to say that his music isn’t what it used to be, they’re always going to fall prey to curiosity and listen to what Drizzy has to say. What, then, is the secret recipe to Drake’s prolonged success, his impressive run of dominance in an industry that is ever changing? It can be boiled down to two factors: his vulnerability and his versatility.
Drake is widely known for his lyrical lamentations about love and heartbreak, and it is in these songs that he is the most vulnerable. The most prominent of these songs is “Marvins Room” off of his 2011 studio album “Take Care.” The track exemplifies Drake’s biggest insecurities, his core identity without the over-the-top confidence and bragging emphasized in many of his other songs. Instead, a heartbroken Drake drunk dials an ex-girlfriend and leaves a jealous voicemail hinting that he wishes they were still together. The rapper explores raw expressions of emotion that sometimes get lost in his genre amidst the ostentatious flexes of money or status. Drake does that well too, but what separates him from the pack and contributes to his long-term success is the relatability that comes from these crooning outpours of heartache. Other songs that exemplify this same sentiment include “Nothings into Somethings” and “Teenage Fever.”
Drake’s vulnerability extends to what he’s willing to try and the risks he’s willing to take. By being so unafraid of criticism, Drake puts himself out in the open to be made fun of and ridiculed. Yet he jeopardizes his dignity because he has the foresight to envision the high reward that accompanies a high risk.
Take the “Hotline Bling’ music video, for example. The song itself was one of the most iconic of the year partially because of its catchy chorus and relaxing beat. But most of the song’s success can be attributed to the music video and the buzz it created. In an otherwise minimalistic video, Drake shamelessly sings and dances along with the lyrics in an unencumbered way that garnered a lot of jokes from a lot of angles. But instead of trying to act tough or defend himself from all of the laughing at his expense, Drake seemed to embrace it and use it to boost the success of the mega-hit. Other examples of Drake embracing the goofy, viral offshoots of his music are the “In My Feelings” challenge that swept the nation in 2018 and the “Toosie Slide” TikTok trend that characterized early quarantine days.
The other important facet of Drake’s success besides his vulnerability is his versatility. While it’s easy (and accurate) to label him as a rapper, his entire catalog of music is much more diverse than the average rapper’s. Drake transcends any one genre as he taps into R&B (“Jungle”), pop (“Hold On, We’re Going Home”) and dancehall (“Passionfruit”) in the span of just one album. In fewer instances, but still notable ones, he’s experimented with international styles of music such as UK drill rap (“War”) and Reggaeton (“Mía”). He even showcased a stylistic departure for the entirety of his 2022 album “Honestly, Nevermind,” in which nearly every song is influenced by alternative genres like dance, house and Afrobeat. Whichever new style Drake is testing out at the moment, it serves his end goal of reaching new audiences and getting more people to listen to his music.
His uber-popular 2016 song “One Dance,” for example, is rightfully classified as pop rather than rap. Its infectious hook and overall structure led fans to deem the song as a departure from the younger Drake’s braggadocious dominance of the rap game and took it as a potential sign of the artist treasonously making a shift to more mainstream pop music. Obviously, Drake knew this when he released the song and made the decision for a reason.
“One Dance” was the first song ever to reach one billion streams on Spotify, solidifying it as one of his most successful records to date. So even though his many pop hits may be perceived as sellouts that are tailored more for mass audiences than true rap fans, they showcase Drake’s versatility in hopping from one genre to another, constantly searching for the next sound that he knows fans will inevitably fall in love with.
Due to his sustained success in the music industry since 2006, it’s challenging to find a Millennial or GenZ-er who hasn’t heard of Drake. It’s time that we start considering the prolific rapper as our generation’s defining artist for both the way he changed rap and the sheer volume of music that he’s contributed to the airwaves over the past 17 years (245, to be exact). For these reasons, Drake was honored as Billboard’s Artist of the Decade in 2021, but he’s nowhere near the end of his career. Whenever “For All The Dogs” drops, there will surely be a new wave of discussions regarding Drake and his legacy as a rapper. For better or worse, everything he does is on everyone’s radar. And that’s exactly what he wants.
