This will be the first extended interview Drake has given since Rolling Stone published a story in February of 2014 that moved him to declare on Twitter that he would no longer be talking to magazines. Still, looking at his newly close-shaved hair and the beard that now covers the lower half of his face like armor, I remember the advice he gave recently on one of his songs- Please do not speak to me like I’m that Drake from four years ago/ I’m at a higher place-and make a point of taking it. I’m really trying to make music for your life.”Īs he says this, Drake projects a practiced but convincing friendliness, and the effort he’s putting into making sure I know he’s being sincere is palpable and disarming. It’s not like I’m just sitting here, just fuckin’ shooting with my eyes closed. He pauses for a second, then continues, leaning into every word: “I mean, I’m really trying. I don’t feel that way about any of my music… If it didn’t connect, I would have a huge problem.”
“I’ve never felt like, ‘Oh, people will bite at anything that’s Drake,’” he says.
He sounds frankly disgusted with the idea. I ask him, as he takes a slow sip of his drink, whether in light of his recent triumphs, he worries at all that he’s had it too easy-whether there’s any risk that he’ll start taking for granted his ability to connect with listeners. And to cap it off, one week after our interview, he’ll fly to Atlanta to record a mixtape with Future called What a Time to Be Alive, which will go on to sell a projected half-million copies in its opening week. As we sit down to talk, the only remaining trace of the recent turbulence Drake experienced during an unexpected clash with Meek Mill is a Top 40 hit in the form of “Back to Back,” a diss track Drake released in the midst of the conflagration. Six even newer tracks-two of which Drake premiered on the Apple Music radio show that his label, OVO Sound, began hosting this summer as part of a reported $19 million deal-subsequently sneaked into the Hot 100. Then, in February, he released a surprise mixtape called If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late, which was comprised of 17 songs that, at one point, all appeared on Billboard’s 50-song Hot R&B/Hip-Hop chart simultaneously. To recap: at the start of summer 2014, Drake posted a song called “0-100/The Catch Up” on his SoundCloud page and watched it turn into a runaway hit with barely any official promotion. Starting with that first record, Drake has been leveling up continuously, and with the huge year he has just had, Views will represent the culmination of yet another growth spurt.
His reps say the LP doesn’t have a release date yet but will be coming out “imminently,” and like every major release Drake has put out since his 2009 mixtape, So Far Gone, it will be released into a world where more people are paying attention to him than ever before. The new record Drake is talking about is Views From the 6, so named after Toronto, the city that is his birthplace, his muse, and his cause.