We solely had a number of hours’ discover earlier than Drake launched Truthfully, Nevermind, his seventh studio album, into the world. As he did with 2021’s Licensed Lover Boy, he presaged its launch by sharing a majestically incoherent word on Apple Music, spilling over with guffaw-worthy Drake-isms. “I can’t keep in mind the final time somebody put they telephone down, appeared me within the eyes, and requested my present perception into the instances,” went one line, which made me marvel if Drake was ready patiently for somebody to quiz him on runaway inflation or how Democrats can keep away from a rout within the midterms. After that, he launched the video for “Falling Again,” a weird and considerably miserable spectacle wherein he marries 23 completely different Instagram fashions. The Drake meme machine appeared to be firing up in preparation of one other typical Drake banquet—ridiculous quotables, samples so absurdly costly that Drake might have used the cash to fund Toronto metropolis faculties for a yr, a tracklist that made you cancel your weekend plans to get by means of the entire thing.
So it’s a little bit of a shock to see that Truthfully, Nevermind is one among his shortest albums ever—14 tracks, over in lower than an hour—and that it comprises just a few transcendently silly Drake Ideas. The album is filed below “dance” on Apple Music, and all through Drake downplays his rapper persona in favor of crooning behind lush, air-conditioned beats. One of many greatest takeaways is how little there may be to… take away. Drake doesn’t reignite any beefs, share any notably extravagant items of gossip, co-opt any large memes, and even utter the identify of a single main chain restaurant. It looks like one smooth-brain dance playlist, like in case you placed on his hit “Passionfruit” and let the algorithm do the work for the subsequent 52 minutes. Let’s get into it:
Drake as soon as once more hits up his African pop connections
As he tends to do every time his music wants a shot of adrenaline, Drake leans closely on up to date African pop right here. After 2015’s drab, cramped VIEWS, he regrouped with 2017’s Extra Life. Now, after Licensed Lover Boy scored the requisite No. 1s whereas principally inducing some well mannered yawns, he’s going again to the effectively. The Congolese-born Afropop musician Tresor labored on six of the album’s 14 songs and contributed vocals to a few; Black Espresso, a longtime Drake collaborator, is listed as one of many album’s govt producers, and his son, Esona Tyolo, has writing and manufacturing credit on “Texts Go Inexperienced.” Truthfully, Nevermind units the BPM at “One Dance” and doesn’t let up.
Truthfully, the unchanging Drake-iness of Drake’s music is beginning to get a bit of creepy
Has any main pop determine of the final 10 years been as resistant to vary as Drake? Maybe probably the most attention-grabbing factor to occur to him all decade was when Pusha T practically murdered him with one line (“You might be hiding a toddler”), however other than seeming knocked on his again foot for a number of hours, he regrouped, advised the world he had hid his baby due to Instagram, and saved on making Drake music. What, if something, might ruffle that composure at this level? Truthfully, Nevermind raises this query much more than Scorpion or Licensed Lover Boy, partially as a result of the lyrics are so interchangeable. By now, Drake albums are like software program updates—they don’t go away till you lastly click on on them, and once you do, you solely discover the stuff that doesn’t work as effectively.
There’s plenty of of simple nostalgia available within the manufacturing
Generally, the beats take loads of tips from late-2000s and early-2010s dance music, and the emphasis is on frictionless, recognizable sounds. Onetime collaborator Jamie xx is an enormous touchpoint, as is Moodymann, Diplo, and numerous high-energy regional dance kinds. On “Currents,” music’s most well-known bedspring sound pops up, however Drake retains it very chaste and earnest, singing, “You’re the lacking piece I been eager for” in opposition to the giggle-inducing squeaka-squeaka.
Drake nearly disappears himself
Generally, there may be little or no rapping. Exterior of “Sticky,” a few of which should have been recorded in the previous few weeks because it comprises a shout-out to Younger Thug and his ongoing authorized drama (“Free Huge Slime out the cage”), and the final monitor, “Jimmy Cooks,” that includes a fierce visitor verse from 21 Savage, Drake performs the background, crooning sweetly in your ear in regards to the methods wherein you might be disappointing to him, personally (“I’m nonetheless holdin’ my breath for the day that you’ll/See that the hassle I make is just too actual/How will you say that you understand how I really feel?”) or how he’s disappointing to you however in case you would solely maintain on a second (“Swervin’ between feelings/I do know we acquired actual points/Can’t give in so еasily.”) Like an HVAC at a Crunch Health, he’s all the time buzzing away within the background, however you generally have bother isolating him from the environment.
Just a few parting ideas…
- On “Sticky,” Drake complains about solely being given a plus one to the Met Gala, so he couldn’t carry D-Block. It’s one of many album’s extra cheap gripes—we have to see Sheek Louch in Timbs and cargo shorts on the crimson carpet.
- Do you know Drake didn’t have already got a track known as “Texts Go Inexperienced”?
- “I do know my funeral gon’ be lit ’explanation for how I handled individuals,” he claims on “Huge.” Does this imply that Drake imagines a tableau of weeping, grateful faces, girls prostrating themselves on the foot of a not too long ago erected golden statue? Or does he dream of brawls, hair-pulling, self-immolations? What are Drake’s ideas on karma, and the hereafter?!
- Let’s say, for a thought experiment, that Drake absconded Earth on Elon Musk’s SpaceX jet with the 23 Instagram fashions he married in “Falling Again,” beginning his personal area cult centered round his personal Genius annotations. On this situation, he by no means releases one other word of unique music, leaving the work of churning out “Drake” music to a deepfake AI. My query right here is: Primarily based on Truthfully, Nevermind, would anybody even discover?
