Arguably one of the best hip-hop/R&B albums of the 2010s, Drake‘s ‘Take Care’ shaped hip-hop with craft and emotional honesty to a new era of hip-hop sound. Here are 5 facts you may not know about the 2013 rap album of the year, which many consider to be Drake’s best album.
5. The Weeknd helped co-write 5 songs on the Grammy winning album. ‘Shot for Me‘ , ‘Crew Love‘ , ‘Good Ones Go Interlude‘ , ‘Practice‘ & ‘The Ride‘ all had contributions from Abel himself.
4. The Weeknd claimed he gave up multiple songs that were supposed to be on his debut mixtape ‘House Of Balloons’ To Drake For ‘Take Care’.
According to an article by Genius, upon hearing mixes and demos of the tracks done by The Weeknd himself, Drake was so in awe with the sound and melody of the songs that he wanted to use them for his own album. In a 2013 complex article asking The Weeknd about him giving up these tracks, it was concluded that although it was not easy for him to give them up, he may have felt a debt of gratitude toward Drake, who the singer called his “closest friend in the industry at that time.” In relation, one of the biggest reasons why The Weeknd blew up in the first place is because his songs that were posted by Drake’s manager, Oliver El-Khatib, on the OVO blog. So in the end it may all have worked out for the both of them in a “help me help you” fashion, as today they are each top musical artists in the world.
3. It was Drakes idea to have Kendrick Lamar on the ‘Buried Alive Interlude.’
In a 2011 interview with XXLmag.com (The year Kendrick was featured on XXL’s annual freshman list) Kendrick talks about how Drake reached out a couple weeks after he dropped his debut studio album, ‘Section.80’. Kendrick sent ‘Section.80’ to drake the night it dropped (via email). Drake then reached out to Kendrick and told him he loved what he did on ‘Section.80’ and wanted Kendrick on his upcoming album. Drake followed by sending K-dot the 40 produced instrumental and told him to ‘”do whatever he wanted to do on it.” The rest is history.
2. Stevie Wonder sat in on a ‘Take Care’ studio sessions in Canada, in fact he is the one playing harmonica on ‘Doing It Wrong.’
In an interview with VEVO News, Drake talks about his relationship with Stevie Wonder. “He helped me out with a lot of the music, just came and sat with me, listened to my music, told me where I could add a couple things to make it more sonically appealing, and not only that but we actually are writing together, which is an incredible experience.”
1. Along with winning a Grammy for best rap album in 2013, Drake’s Take Care album broke the record in 2019 for the most weeks on Billboard‘s Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart since the ranking began in 1965, beating out J Cole’s featureless grammy winning album, ‘Forrest Hills Drive’.
“Since Take Care I been care taking.” – Drake on his ‘VIEWS’ song, ‘Redemption.’
