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The highly anticipated, first studio album from the overnight sensation Drake could be everything and more for listeners or it could be viewed as a big disappointment—thus making the name “Thank Me Later” completely apropos.

Thank Me Later feels like Drake’s autobiography of how his fame and success have changed his life for the better and for the worse over the last year and a half.

The first song on the album, “Fireworks,” starts off with the line, “Money just changed everything, I wonder how life without it would go.”

Drake feat. Jay-Z and Swizz Beatz – “Fancy” (Cookin Soul Remix)

“Over,” the first single from the album, suggest that he has come in contact with so many new people over the last year that it makes him hard to distinguish who is who. Drake says “I know wayt too many people here right now, that I didn’t know last year. Who the Fawk are y’all?”

Those that are looking for the mixtape feel of “So Far Gone” or some of the harder, rougher collaborations that Drake has been featured on in the last year and a half, are going to be highly disappointed.

This album is exactly what it is meant to be for Drake—his first “Studio” album.

Thank Me Later will be categorized into Hip Hop or R&B because the general public feels the need to put each musical album into their own category.

But Thank Me Later is a combination of both, which creates good music. Drake mixes a 50 cent like flow with and 808’s and Heartbreak sound giving listeners something different.  

Because of Drake’s pre-album success he was able to work with some of the game best artist and producers. But this may have hurt the overall feel to the album. Thank Me Later is a lot less Drake than what most people are used to from his mixtape start where he often rapped for 3 and 4 straight minutes.

Drake’s Thank Me Later features guest appearances from T.I., Swizz Beatz, Nicki Minaj, Alicia Keys, Jay-Z, The-Dream, Young Jeezy and Lil Wayne with production from Timbaland, Crada, 40, Francis and the Lights, Jeff Bhasker, Al Khaliq, Kanye West, No I.D., Omen, Swizz Beatz, Boi-1da and Tone Mason.

Some of these collabs meshed well for Drake on this album but others such as his collaboration with Jay-Z in “Light Up” and T.I. in “Fancy” left Drake somewhat upstaged by these rap veterans.

Jay Says, in “Light Up”:

I’m not as cool with n-g*as as I once was, I once was, cool as the fonz was, but these bright lights turned me to a monster/ Sorry mama I promised they wouldn’t change me, but I woulda went insane, had I remain the same ME, F-ck n*ggas, Beyotches too, All I got is this money, this will do.

In reference to the Kat Stack’s of the world, in “Fancy,” T.I. says:

“Well aren’t you a breath of fresh air from all these superficial gold digging bitches in here/they get a baller think that they aint got to pick a career/guess they plan on sucking some packages until some millions appear.”

These lines alone upstage Drake in these two songs. But how many rappers would T.I. and Jay-z not upstage in a song?

Drake’s feeling of being young, gifted, and miserable are ever-so-present on this album. He speaks of influential women and how his gift of having talent is also his curse that prevents him from living a normal life.

And though he rants and raves about this lack of a “life”, it’s hard to feel sorry for the superstar.

Thank Me Later is more of an R&B album than a rap album. If you can grasp that, then you will probably think it is even more spectacular than the hype it has already generated.

If you go into this album as a fan of good music, you will enjoy it—you may even love it. If you go into this album thinking it is Hip-Hop and that this album somewhat resembles The Carter I, II, or III, you will be done listening to the album by the third track.

Whether you like this album or not when we look back on Thank Me Later in a few years and we will view this album, not as hip hop or R&B, but we will see that Drake was in his own lane that we could not describe on June 15th 2010.

So thank him now or thank him later but you will thank Drake, one day.

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