The bar that best encapsulates the stakes, mindset, mood and ensuing aftermath of Nothing Was the Same isn't on actually on the album, nor its bonus tracks. It's not on the excellent, iconically boastful verses complimentary to that era like "5AM in Toronto" or "Over Here." It's from the interim between album cycles, on French Montana's "Pop That" where Drake raps "Dropped Take Care, bought a motherfuckin' crib/ And I'm picking up the keys to the bitch right now."
That crib is the star of many memorable scenes on Nothing Was the Same, from playing tennis with Serena on the backyard courts, to Drake hilariously idly wondering if he should casually "donate a million to some children," while naked women swim in the pool. What you need to know about this mansion Drake bought—a "compound," as he'd later clarify on "Paris Morton Music 2"—is that, so the story goes, it's the exact house Drake has had as a computer screensaver since his days as a gawky Degrassi teen who bought Pusha-T mics on eBay.
After delivering what's more-or-less agreed as a seminal album in Take Care, things changed for Drake and something changed in him. 2013 found him feeling validated. Copping your actual dream house and getting a Grammy shipped to it will do that. Nothing Was the Same is all about unpacking that surreality, and how common it is now: the dinners with Tatyana; checks big enough to make you vomit; the after-hours at il Mulino with Live Nation's CEO. As well as the dark side of uber-fame: paranoia, club fights, family distances both physical and emotional, sustained romantic unavailability.
With no disrespect to the summer of 2015, creating Nothing Was the Same was Drake at his most charged up. With the onus on him to prove that sweet mix of critical and commercial acclaim on Take Care wasn't a one-off, the album represents Drake at his most disciplined—thirteen tracks!—and, stacked up against his ensuing albums Views and Scorpion, seemingly the last time he was truly creative. Scorpion is double NWTS but it doesn't have the A Side/B Side aesthetics in one song scored by 40 and Jake One. Or 40 going full Heatmakerz with three beats off one Whitney sample and Drake matching his ambition with three different flows. It doesn't have A1 sequencing like the audio suite created by placing "Wu-Tang Forever" and "Own It" next to each other. It doesn't have "Worst Behavior," arguably Drake's best song.
NWTS is where Drake first began to master his something for everyone approach: songs for weddings, club anthems for the bros, hard beats and bars for the lyrical miracle crowd. There's experimental flows, like the performance Detail culls in "305 to My City" and experimental sounds like the midnight-drive scene Hudson Mohawke paints on "Connect." All of it—especially making the only rap feature the GOAT on the same song he says he salutes "the niggas who paved the way for us" then says he's doing it better —is in service of one grand statement. On Take Care, it was "really, think I like who I'm becoming." Here, that sentiment matured into "You know it's real when you are who you think you are." Nothing Was the Same is Drake, fully formed, arriving in a Bugatti no less.—Frazier Tharpe
13. "305 to My City"
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Producer: Detail
Ever the nomad, Drake uses this latter-half track to map out a destination from one of his adopted cities, Miami, to his actual hometown of Toronto. A slow-winding song dedicated to the idea of flying a stripper back home with him, the outro sees Drake putting on his best Judy Garland, crooning, “we’re not in Kansas anymore”—which is partially why it lands last on this list. The song’s main highlight is Detail’s vocals on the chorus—other than that, it doesn’t contain anything too special.
12. "Own It" f/ PARTYNEXTDOOR
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Producer: Detail
“Own It” is a Drizzy special, combining a sadboy lust for love with confident dismissals of competition and ex-flames. As the opening lines make clear, it’s a companion piece of sorts to “Wu-Tang Forever,” the softer B-side to the previous track’s testosterone and bravado. Sonically, the track is fine, its placement on the album’s tracklist perfectly suited for its sound, but the overall execution leaves something to be desired. The lyrics border on cheesy, with the lowest point coming from the line, “I don’t wanna fuck, I wanna make love.” The track’s high point, though? Drake saying “sorry” with a Canadian inflection.
11. "From Time" f/ Jhené Aiko
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Producer: Noah "40" Shebib
In 2013, Jhené Aiko was everywhere, and this 40-produced song might have been her biggest guest spot. Aiko offers a loving but aloof chorus, comfortable with the distanced nature of her relationship but questioning how it came to be that way. Drake plays off of it by exploring the concept of love through several lenses, including his relationship with his father and his mother’s fear of ending up alone in old age.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with the track, but there’s also nothing that sets it completely apart, though it was apparently one of Drake’s favorites. The formula, a soothing chorus juxtaposed with resentful, sometimes angry Drizzy lyrics, is seen later in the album on “Too Much,” to much better results.
10. "Connect"
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Producer: Noah "40" Shebib, Hudson Mohawke
“Connect” tells the tale of a toxic, on-and-off partnership. It’s Drake at his most passive aggressive, featuring zingers from, “Isn’t it amazing/ How you talk all this shit and we still lack communication?” to “Wish you would learn how to love people and use things/ And not the other way around.”
It’s an effective song when looking at Nothing Was the Same as a whole, serving as a good transition between “Hold On, We’re Going Home” and “The Language,” but still is easily skippable. Drake’s “swangin’” was catchy for about 10 minutes, but five years later, we’re more than over it.
9. "The Language"
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Producer: Allen Ritter, Vinylz, Boi-1da
Drake, a thespian through and through, has presented a variety of personas through his music— Mean Drake, Sad Drake, Jamaican Drake—with each as entertaining as the last. Few, however, bring about the energy and artistry that Zero Fucks Drake brings, and “The Language” is a serving platter for that braggadocio. The track, with references to motor-mouthed rappers and those talking reckless to “get a reaction,” was interpreted as shots fired back at Kendrick Lamar for his “Control” verse, in which he viciously called out several of rap’s elite in the spirit of competition. While Drake never fully confirmed this, he said in a 2013 Vibe interview that while he isn’t interested in getting caught up in beef and exchanging responses, above all, he “stood his ground” on the track.
Drake navigates through “The Language” with patient confidence, undeterred by any distractions. While subliminal shots earned him half credit at best, any addition to the simmering tension between Drake and Kendrick is always welcome, especially when it’s well done.
8. "Pound Cake/Paris Morton Music 2" f/ JAY-Z
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Producer: Detail, Jordan Evans, Boi-1da
A two-part track that almost saw its first half end up on Magna Carta...Holy Grail, Drake takes the opportunity here to swap verses with mentor and occasional frenemy, Jay-Z.
The third of what has now been four collaborations between the two, “Pound Cake” was born out of interesting circumstances, the process beginning when Drake heard Jay’s verses during a session with Beyoncé. After asking Jay for permission for the vocals—just the a capella at that!—the track was produced and mixed, then sent back to the God MC. Hov, intrigued by the song, almost kept it for his own release, but honored his word and let Drake keep it.
“Pound Cake” shows Drake putting forth some of his finest work lyrically. The key moment? The transition to “Paris Morton Music 2,” when Drake proclaims, “Fuck all that happy to be here shit that y’all want me on/ I’m the big homie, they still tryna lil bro me, dog,” standing defiantly out of his guest feature shadow.
7. "Hold On, We're Going Home" f/ Majid Jordan
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Producer: Noah "40" Shebib, Jordan Ullman, Nineteen85
The predecessor to modern Drake pop-dance bangers, Nothing Was The Same’s second single stood out from his previous releases, even given his established penchant for singing. Helped along by Canadian R&B duo, and eventual OVO Sound signees Majid Jordan, the song elicits ‘80s vibes. It was a purposeful effort from Drake and 40 who, according to Drake, was channeling Quincy Jones and Michael Jackson when making the record, and attempting to create a song that “will be played at weddings two years from now.”
Upon its release, the song’s appeal was rooted not just in Drake’s improved singing abilities (helped by his work with a vocal coach) but also in the track’s mesmerizing, nostalgic sound. Today, the feeling elicited by the instrumentation has been replaced with authentic, tangible nostalgia for the track’s initial release. It’s both familiar and original, and helped solidify Drake as a multi-faceted star.
6. "Furthest Thing"
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Producer: Hagler, Noah "40" Shebib
Second on the tracklist, “Furthest Thing” sees Drake existing in duality. The song is split into two separate parts: infidelity and human infallibility take up first half, while ownership of his boss legend status dominate the second. Shortly after admitting his failures as a human, Drake shrugs it all off, comfortable and confirmed in his success, boldly proclaiming that this, above all, is the shit he wants to go out to. It’s Drake in his most concentrated form, a tightly packaged paradox of insecurity and bravado.
5. "Wu-Tang Forever"
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Producer: Noah "40" Shebib
An ode to paranoia played out over a sample of Zodiac’s “Loss Config.,” “Wu-Tang Forever” finds Drake airing out all his trust issues, remarking that a boyfriend’s sexual ineptitude is the only reason that the woman in the song is with Drake, and acknowledging his fear of being in public without protection.
The track, just 19 bars centered between two choruses, shows that not even brevity can hold Drake back. His confidence is on ten as he raps, “I don't know what's getting into me, I just like the rush/ When you see your enemy somewhere in the club and you realize/ He just not in a position to reciprocate your energy/ You ain't never worried cause he's not who he pretends to be.” From the Wu-Tang sample that comes later on in “Pound Cake” to the continuation of the song’s “it’s yours” refrain into “Own It,” “Wu-Tang Forever” is one of the seminal tracks on Nothing Was the Same.
4. "Too Much" f/ Sampha
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Producer: Nineteen85, Sampha
Sampha, who would go on to receive a solo track on Drake’s More Life, made his first appearance on an Aubrey release here. His soulful, haunting chorus is a sample of his own song of the same name, while the beat, put together by frequent Drake collaborator Nineteen85, switches back and forth from solemn to frantic. Sampha’s vocals give way to Drake’s anxiety-loaded verses, where he takes stock of his success and journey in music and contemplates its ramifications.
It’s perfectly balanced, with Sampha and Drake each working as the yin to the other’s yang. Drake’s verses feel as dizzying as the life he attempts to portray through them, and only once he’s done and Sampha’s harmonizing fades out do you begin to fully catch your breath. They premiered the track on The Tonight Show.
3. "Started From The Bottom"
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Producer: Mike Zombie
The album’s lead single, “Started from the Bottom” offered up a change in Drake’s flow, as well as a blood-in-the-water moment for critics who scoffed at the idea that the former Degrassi star had ever been at the “bottom.” Drake took time to address the criticism, saying in a 2013 MTV interview that he “just wanted to make it known that I did work really hard to get here, and it wasn't just a fluke. It wasn't easy by any means." While the hype around the track had died down by the time Nothing Was the Same was finally released, the song resonated enough that a remix of it morphed into DJ Khaled’s “No New Friends.”
With a simplified flow and cadence, Drake floats over the piano-laden beat, refraining from doing too much but never doing too little, either. His rhymes are straightforward and to the point, opting for concision over intricacy and coming out better for it. Critics be damned: “Started” is the sort of anthem that only Drake can make, the kind that penetrates society and introduces new phrases into the common vernacular.
2. "Tuscan Leather"
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Producer: Noah "40" Shebib
Built on a sample of Whitney Houston’s “I Have Nothing,” Nothing Was The Same’s six-minute opener features three separate switch ups, each doing its part to emphasize the verse that accompanies it. Verses one and two find Drake boasting and flexing, each with increasing energy, while the third and final verse, accompanied by a piano bar-esque beat, sees him contemplative and meta, at one point taking the voice of a third party to marvel at the amount of time devoted to the opening track.
Drake isn’t the first rapper to spend an exorbitant amount of time on an introduction song, but his approach is what earns the song such high placement. Each verse can be looked at as the three phases of his career to that point, from underdog to up-and-comer to the top of the industry. While his fear of fame is still present throughout the album, gone is the hesitation that comes with being a relative newcomer to the game. Here, nearly five years after the release of So Far Gone, Drake is as comfortable as ever, not preparing to take the top spot in rap’s hierarchy, but embarrassed for anyone who doesn’t realize that he’s been there for a minute.
1. "Worst Behavior"
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Producer: DJ Dahi
“Worst Behavior” is an aggressive, intimidating statement, carving the path for the Tough Drake that would appear a year and a half later on If You’re Reading This, It’s Too Late. As on “Started from the Bottom,” Drizzy opts for the “less is more” approach to lyricism for the majority of this track. But while the approach in the former was for storytelling purposes, the intent here is letting the energy speak for itself. “You know me? You know me?/ I’m liable to do anything when it comes to that you owe me” isn’t exactly Pulitzer-worthy, but screamed out at the top of your lungs with enough vigor, it has the power to make you feel invincible. From start to finish, it’s a song built for feeling yourself, suitable for belting out solo behind the wheel or with the homies during a rowdy night. It’s the standout track of the album, a gem in Drake’s library, and a testament to his star power.
