Music Review: If You're Reading This It's Too Late

It has been a rough month for the Cash Money label. For years, Birdman’s business has been home to stars like Lil Wayne, Nicki Minaj, Tyga and, of course, Drake. The month of February has seen both Weezy’s lawsuit to free himself from his contract and the surprise release of Drake’s fourth mixtape If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late. The latter is an interesting way to exploit a loophole; the mixtape, due to its atypically commercial release, will count towards the four-album requirement he owes to the label, thus severing his contract. It is a savvy move on Drake’s part—one that points to even more creative flexibility in the future—but it begs the question of whether or not such a haphazardly released work is of equally haphazard quality. If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late is the weakest of his four main commercial releases but still a solid artistic statement and a worthwhile listen.

The main knock against If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late is its pervasive sense of familiarity. Simply put, there is nothing here that Drake has not done before. Most of the mixtape’s tracks are produced by his two main collaborators, Noah “40” Shebib and Boi-1da, and there is little in the way of sonic innovation. “40”’s production is more of his usual narcotic haze, though it is still a great canvas for Drake’s introspective musings. Boi-1da fares slightly better, called in whenever the album needs a shot of caffeine, but, in general, the mixtape’s songs run together like slurred words.

Drake is in fine form technically, yet lyrically he seems to be stuck in a bit of a rut. Since his second album, Take Care, Drizzy has been our saddest rapper (hence the bevy of Internet memes lampooning his moping), and the combination of syrup-slow beats and self-loathing is numbing over the course of sixteen tracks. Many of his best songs tap into latent human insecurity—his 2013 collaboration with Jhené Aiko, “From Time,” is one of my favorite rap songs ever—but one longs for a little more playfulness in his work. It seems like it has been a while since Drake has seemed happy, and If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late does nothing to really dispel this notion.

That said, taken on its own merits and circumstance, the mixtape has its moments. “6 God,” released back in November, is far and away the best song here, full of swaggering braggadocio and callbacks to his old work (listen for the guttural “Worst!” from “Worst Behavior”). “Preach,” a unique collaboration with the producer PARTYNEXTDOOR, is the type of slow-burning club-thumper that simultaneously echoes deep house and ‘90’s rap. It is an intoxicating brew that hints at a delightful new path for Drake’s music. Only a few other rappers (Vic Mensa, Nicki Minaj, Young Paris and Azealia Banks) have attempted the deep house/rap fusion, and Drake could be a likely candidate to succeed at this mix due to his prodigious rapping and singing skills. That will have to wait for the next album, which will hopefully be a step up from this one. Drake should be considered an essential part of the rap canon at this point, but If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late, for all of its merits, sounds as tossed off as its physical release.