Album Reviews

Drake is now a walking corporation. Actually, he’s an entire industry. As he enters his career’s second decade, he’s invincible in a way unseen since Michael Jackson (to whom Drake frequently compares himself). He escapes every scandal unscathed: a secret kid with a porn star, accusations of sexual harassment, cultural appropriation, and using ghostwriters; Pusha T’s brutal diss track, and questions regarding contact with teen celebrities don’t harm the artist born Aubrey Graham. Just one of the above kills or greatly diminishes most stars’ relevance; Drake is so culturally omnipresent that he won’t go away anytime soon. Whenever he drops a somewhat mediocre lead single, I say “he’s struggling for relevance now, his reign is almost over.” And? Said single becomes an inescapable hit. The full-length project drops, and everyone walking the earth stops dead in their tracks to stream it. His music is meant to sound emotionally genuine, yet nowadays Drake and his OVO team carefully calculate his every word.

Each new release proves Drake’s relevance a product of his versatility; his alternating between heartbroken melodic R&B, club hits, and the pop rap middle ground widens his appeal. The sheer length of his projects provide something for everyone, but are a burden to sit through. His 2016-18 releases Views, More Life, and Scorpion respectively last 81, 82, and 90 minutes. You’re not supposed to listen to the album, rather formulate playlists of your preferred songs. Still, it partially explains why critics such as myself aren’t exactly raving about his projects (some of which have amazing highlights, interspersed with filler). Hours before its release, Drake announced Dark Lane Demo Tapes, a mixtape of recent demos and previously leaked outtakes. The tape’s shorter tracklist relieved me; finally, only 14 songs! Though despite the mere (for Drake, anyway) 50-minute runtime, it’s still a slog.

In early April, Drizzy dropped “Toosie Slide,” essentially a Drake-processed “Cha Cha Slide” manufactured for TikTok (the track’s dance originated from online personality Toosie). Naturally, many spectators said, “Drake is struggling for relevance, he’s clearly desperate for a TikTok hit.” That first part ended up false. TikTok kids clearly couldn’t help but go right foot up, left foot slide, left foot up, right foot slide; men trying to impress TikTok girls apparently thought that inefficiently walking forward in squares would be impressive, and the formulaic laziness of “Toosie Slide” debuted as the #1 song in America. Still, nobody expected a track of “Toosie Slide”’s nature to be the lead single for an entire mixtape (or as some call it, a “not-an-album”).

Dark Lane Demo Tapes, like every Drake project, has four types of songs: derivative “experiments,” sad late night isolation vibe tracks, introspective rap songs prominently using samples, and generic trap bangers. Mixtape opener “Deep Pockets,” a Scorpion outtake, is of the first category; it sounds highly reminiscent of Frank Ocean’s Endless, yet differs enough from the other Dark Lane tracks to memorably stand out. “When To Say When,” “Landed,” and “Losses” deal with Drake’s insecurities and ever-increasing paranoia; “Chicago Freestyle,” “Desires,” and “Not You Too” fit into the sad vibe category; and “Toosie Slide,” “Time Flies,” “From Florida With Love,” and “Demons” are trap cuts that don’t particularly engage. Following the tape’s release, the Playboi Carti-featuring, P’ierre Bourne-produced “Pain 1993” became its most hyped moment. Carti, who recently reemerged on Twitter, is frustratingly overdue on his upcoming LP Whole Lotta Red, leaving fans hungry for something, anything. The song itself greatly underwhelms; Drake’s hook is catchy, but Carti’s verse is unintelligibly squeakier than ever. Many likened Carti’s voice change to “reverse puberty,” and for all anyone knows, his verse is flexing excessive helium use.

If you’ve heard enough of Drake’s work, Dark Lane Demo Tapes is predictably more of the same. He uses his several formulas ad infinitum, each time to near-equal results. No matter what you think of the actual music, there’s absolutely no denying that Drizzy has fine-tuned wildly successful, easy to replicate formulas unlike any artist in history. Pop reigns like his last long for a reason, and I see no end to Drake’s relevance. And his music is good enough that such circumstances would be easily acceptable.

Sound Quality

As there’s currently no vinyl edition, for this review I referenced the 44.1/24 MQA stream. It’s not audiophile material, but the mixes are clean and the mastering is quite listenable. Just like the music, the sound quality is pleasant enough for a listen but not a reason to regularly return to Dark Lane Demo Tapes.

(Malachi Lui is an AnalogPlanet contributing editor, music lover, record collector, Drainer, and highly opinionated sneaker enthusiast. Listen to his monthly playlist on Spotify and Tidal and follow him on Twitter: @MalachiLui.)