FanPost

On the album "Views" by Drake

It would be wise to preface this entire fanpost by noting that Popular Culture happenings are not my forte. New music, even by bands/artists I enjoy, often does not make it into my earholes for years. My memory is a grasshopper on a fish hook in a local pond.

It's apparently okay for Mike Matheny to forget Aldemys Diaz can hit well. Me? Well at least my memory problems aren't negatively impacting peoples' income potential. OR are they!>

I've purchased five albums since 2010 and I've listened to four of them. They were okay. Are you feeling my influence on the music world? Let's go;

You've read three paragraphs now and can estimate my surprise when the Music Formation Group of America (MFGA) contacted me to review Drake's newest album. It is my great pleasure to review this album as a means to promote growth in the Hip Hop Community. Artists work hard on their art and I love nothing more than calling attention to artists' art.

I will give you a track-by-track breakdown of the album.

Keep the Family Close
Drake starts off the record with a political statement and it's disgusting. I hope every song is not this bad.

9
A series of pops and clicks with low-tone droning. I get that he's trying to appeal to the marijuana crowd, but it sounded like a cut-and-paste Four Tet track faded into a discarded SunnO))) riff. If Drake is trying to assert his identity as a game-changer, he's not hacking it so far on this record.

U With Me?
Wow! Drake hits hard with solid lyrics here. He dares to ask if we are with him. But we are only possibly with him in spirit, if at all. I'm not sure why he feels a need to ask so many times. Also: He calls attention to the glory-days-long-past in which artists (Prince, TLC, Korn) used numbers and single letters to represent words. A Cultural icon referencing cultural icons. The brilliance is damaging my spinal fluid; more like brake fluid. Floor on accelerator, let's go!

Feel No Ways
The Accelerator pedal has been removed. Oh boy. The first ballad on the record. I spent most of this song trying to figure out why the bottom of my blue jeans has a small tear in it. I followed the care instructions on the tag and I haven't tried to climb barbed wire recently. Does anyone out there sell a reasonably sturdy pair of jeans anymore??shit.

Hype
An attempt to right the Fun Ship after a boring ballad, I think. This one samples the 1988 Winger classic Party Jam "Poison Angel" to absolute perfection. I anticipate this song to peak in popularity in July of this year.

Weston Road Flows
Yes it does, Drake. Weston Road does flow and it's so wonderful. Thank you for this song. The album needed it.

Redemption
Someone is playing a piano and there's a violin a little bit out of time. There are no lyrics. I'm not sure this is Drake. Do all of his records have songs like this?

With You
A cover of Linkin Park's classic from the year 2000. Highlight: When Drake was screaming "With You" during the chorus, he really took those lyrics and made them his own-- I've not heard that level of lyrical ownership taken on a cover song since Jimi Hendrix covered "All Along The Watchtower", which was originally an Bob Dillan song.

Faithful
An ode to Moms everywhere. I picked the right day to finish this review! I have to admit that I got a little teary-eyed as the last few lines were spoken and the track faded. Very good song. At least an anthem for today.

Still Here
After "Faithful", I focused on the lyrics for this song. Even though the snare drum was a little too tinny for me, I was able to hold it together. Turns out, Drake wants us all to understand that, even though he's 29 now, his music is still "fresh" and he's "not likely to go away any time soon". That's great, I think because I'm not through the album yet.

Controlla
We're back to the stoned-out vibes, huh,Mr. Drake? I get it. I really do. But you're the millionaire! Something tells me this isn't the last I've heard of this style on this record.

One Dance
This song has six verses about searching for apartments in Toronto, making it (from a lyrical-content standpoint) the strongest hip hop track I've heard since the 80s. Clocking in at 9.5 minutes, it felt more like 7.5. I could have done without the VisitMaine dot com advertisements in the middle.

Grammys
Finally, a touching tribute to the tributes of Artists. If satan is part of the Engineers of American Heritage, this song will sweep the Grammys and Drake will perform it on Dick Clark's New Years Rockin' Eve celebration.

Childs Play
When artists experiment, it's bound to fail more often than not. Drake's friends flexed their Matt Holliday production muscles on this, but it fell flat without any real beat. This song literally didn't have a beat. Kind of like an exhaust fan whirring.

Pop Style
An unexpected Taylor Swift diss track. I avoid pop music because it often times becomes self important and attempts to reference false drama. With no Frame of Understanding by which to measure what he says about Taylor, I focused on the snare drum. Turns out this song doesn't have a snare drum. At least I'm pretty sure it didn't. Sounded like a metal trash can lid. More on snare drums later.

Too Good
Yep, there it is again. Drake wants you to be stoned right now. Or he was stonedListen, I don't know how Stoned people function or who is supposed to be high. Regardless, the previous track ("Pop Style") faded into this song, which was a devolving echo of machine noises. At one point, I could hear "Controlla" playing a second time in the background. You can say Drake's trying to be progressive, but this just seems like a new way to fill album space.

Summers Over Interlude
An interlude that morphs into a 1.5+ minute Speed Rap, a dramatic tribute to the end of summers. This song will invoke a certain level of dread for the young people that consume Drake's music and hate when summers end.

We've had a few tracks that feel like filler, so I'm lead to believe these last two songs will be the emotional climax for which we all thirst.

Fire and Desire
Snare drums are sometimes the best part of songs. If you like snare drums, this song is for you. The producer pulled out all the stops. Great timbre, great enthusiasm and great rhythmic transitioning. I did not hear a damn lyric because I was so excited.

Views
Drake does an impression of Ja Rule, who was doing an impression of Tupac, who was doing an impression of 2pac. Hip hop is too "meta" for me to tolerate much more often than an occasional review.

Final review: 6.8 out of 10. Rent it or borrow it before deciding to buy.