That track and Sampha's feature ('4422'), where the singer gets deeper emotionally than Drake ever has, don't do Drake any favors. His dramatic rapping and outsized persona put Drake to shame on 'Ice Melts.' He's Technicolor, while Drake is various shades of gray. There are some tracks that break free of the boredom and show some kind of pulse - usually the tracks where guests drop by and add their skills to the mix. These moments are too few and far between and most of the record sits right in the center of the rut Drake has dug for himself over the years. The bubbling 'Passionfruit' is Drake at his smooth, melancholy best, showing off his skill at creating surprising melodies and entrancing atmosphere. He only really comes to life on the songs where he drops the hard façade and lets some of his emotion show through, like the lovely island-inflected groover 'Get It Together,' which features Jorja Smith killing it in the role often occupied by Rihanna, or the dark-night-of-the-soul ballad 'Nothings into Somethings,' which balances his intimate crooning with introspective rapping. Listening to track after track of molasses-slow trap featuring Drake going on about how once he was on the bottom and now is firmly cemented at the top is tiresome at best, painful at worst. The main problem is that he's a better hip-hop-inspired R&B singer than he is an R&B-inspired rapper, but he refuses to acknowledge it. Over the course of 22 songs and almost an hour and a half of music, Drake shows again why he's one of the most frustrating rappers in the world.

Buy the album Starting at $18.09Īfter releasing the hugely popular but artistically underwhelming Views in 2016, Drake went back to the mixtape approach for his next release, 2017's More Life. Purchase and download this album in a wide variety of formats depending on your needs.

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