There was a summer before I went into university in my gap year that involved me driving a lot, especially late at night. I would often work evening shifts at my job at the grocery store and would drive my friends home from parties because I didn’t drink. I really dislike driving, but when it’s night and the streets are empty, my mood towards driving really changes and I almost enjoy it. At the time, I was a huge Drake fan and was very much in love with his album Take Care. Take Care might be my favourite album of all time. I think that at the time I first heard it in high school, it provided a different outlook on hip hop. One that isn’t full of machismo and grit. My problem with hip hop is that I do not relate with what a lot of hip hop artists would experience in their upbringing. Besides Kanye, Drake was one of the first mainstream rappers to talk about his feelings. The album itself is a masterpiece. It has a great combination of club hits, unique guest features, and slow jams. There was something about that album that really resonated with me during that particular summer. I think Take Care, is an album that is very much about Drake becoming the man he always wanted to be, and I would relate it to my personal growth as an adult, having finished high school. Thank Me Later and So Far Gone are good albums respectively but I always felt like they were a little more immature in their sound. And perhaps it was the coming of my university and blossoming young adult life that made me feel that way about Take Care. All I can say is that the feeling I had driving down the streets of London, Ontario – on a slow summer night while bumping Over My Dead Body, is a sensation I will probably never feel again.
