Album Review: Take Care (Drake)

Artist: Drake

Album: Take Care [Deluxe Edition]

Genre: Hip-Hop/R&B

Release Date: November 15, 2011

Truly, I could never say I was a "fan" of Drake before Take Care. The so-called Young Money protege behind Lil Wayne and Birdman, just never seemed to impress me and always strayed far behind any artist who combined hip-hop and R&B. Take Care, shed a new light on my perception of Drake. Although it isn't my album of the year, it is a refreshing breath on something I thought we've seen the full potential of.

The album starts off with what I thought was a typical hip-hop album introduction of this decade (good sample, deepest lyricism of the album...Really if you wanted to know more I could refer you to at least 10 other albums that followed this same pattern) but actually became my favorite track on the album. Over My Dead Body features Chantal Kreviazuk (Thank you for passing on Nicki Minaj) and sets the mood of the whole album, when I say that I mean that Drake really had some "I guess you win some, lose some," moments on this album.

Promptly followed by Over My Dead Body, Drake shows more of his emotional side through his song Shot For Me, which really exemplifies his previous relationships and how they've affected his connections with his closest ones. As an emotional song, Drake stays mostly to his singing and more of an R&B feel to get his point across, which works well with the objective song. Picking up after Shot For Me, the album picks up in intensity with the first single of the album Headlines where Drake keeps strictly to his rapping and even takes a few shot at his "haters" by stating "I might be too strung on compliments, overdosed on confidence," well you get the point...


As the very mood-dependent roller-coaster known as Take Care continues, the album slows back down to fit for the song Crew Love, which features R&B artist The Weeknd and is the slowest track on the album. Picking back up the intensity of the roller-coaster, Take Care which features Rhianna brings Drake back to one of the deepest lyricism of his rapping on the album.


The albums slows back up again with Marvins Room/Buried Alive Interlude, which is a very experimental form of Drakes mixture of styles, but works well through his experimentation. The album picks back up for the next few tracks as Drake uses his rapping on the songs Underground Kings and We'll Be Fine. 


Drakes second single off Take Care, Make Me Proud which features Nicki Minaj is one of the catchiest tracks on the album, that had the hook stuck in my head for a week after the release and also had one of the best rap instrumentals of the album. Continuing on the upbeat run of the album, Lord Knows, the best hip-hop instrumental on the album features Rick Ross and the producing styling of Roc-A-Fella records producer, Just Blaze. Both Drake and Rick Ross work well on the track, and really use the instrumental to its full potential. 


What is a Young Money records production without a song that reps "the team"? Cameras/ Good Ones Go Interlude, is a track where Drake reps his "team" (Young Money, Cash Money Records) with the repetitive lyrics of "how you mean, how you mean, what you know about the team?" 


The album takes a more slow approach on the next three tracks, Doing It Wrong, The Real Her, and Look What You've Done but show Drakes best R&B feel of the album with those three tracks. The Real Her features Lil Wayne and Andre 3000, Outkast's true hip-hop gentleman as rare of a feature as this is (Andre 3000 only does about 5-6 features a year, but always delivers on every feature) and really shows a strong R&B mixture on this track.


The album picks back up and continues to at a more upbeat pace with the next three tracks HYFR, Practice, and The Ride. Practice was one of the most creative tracks on the album, the instrumental is a slower paced version of Southern rapper Juvenille's 1998 popular track Back That Azz Up and Drake mixes his singing and rapping on this song, by taking some parts of the original song and adding a lot of his own to make it a brilliant refreshing version of the original (sorry Juve, but you can't compete with Drake's singing).


Overall, the album was in my opinion, Drakes best work of art thus far. Regardless the album competes for dominance between his R&B singing and his hip-hop rapping, the album found a way to make it work in a brilliant way. The album features a lot of well-known artists including Andre 3000, Lil Wayne, Rick Ross, Nicki Minaj, The Weeknd, and Rihanna. Even though there was those "I guess you win some, lose some,"* moments the overall "outcome is income."*


*(Reference to Over My Dead Body)

My Rating: