Views (album)

Background

The album's title was first announced as Views from the 6, as it first appeared from a report in a July 2014 article from Billboard. According to Drake on Twitter, "the 6" is a reference to his hometown of Toronto, Ontario. On April 29, 2016, it was revealed that the title had been shortened to Views. The cover artwork for Views was released via Drake's Twitter account on April 24, 2016, which features Drake sitting atop the CN Tower in Toronto. The fact that Drake was significantly larger than life-size on the cover was widely discussed, and CN Tower's Twitter account later confirmed it to be photoshopped.

Promotion

Drake premiered a single, called "Summer Sixteen" through OVO Sound Radio on January 30, 2016. The track was produced by 40, Boi-1da and Cubeatz. The song contains a slowed-down sample of "Glass Tubes" performed by Brian Bennett. The cover art was designed by Filip Pągowski, who was a creator of the Comme des Garçons logo. The song peaked at number six on the Billboard Hot 100, selling 215,000 copies in its first week, making it the highest debut sales of Drake's career. On March 26, 2016, that single sold 358,000 copies in the United States.

On April 4, 2016, the album was initially teased in London. On April 9, Drake released a trailer for Views on Twitter. Drake opened the "pop-up" stores, giving away free black and white T-shirts with "Views" written on the front. According to 40, a mixes for the clean versions were finished, as well as having all sample clearances and credits were finalized. On April 26, Drake revealed that Views would include 20 or more songs than any of his previous albums, excluding the bonus tracks. After his last "pop-up" store stop in his home city of Toronto, Drake released the album's cover artwork on social media. On April 29, the album premiered on Apple Music's OVO Sound Radio, following his interview with Beats 1's radio host Zane Lowe, and then released on both Apple Music and iTunes exclusively, followed by a release on to other digital retailers and a physical release a week later, and a release on to other streaming services a week after that. On May 14, Drake was the host and musical guest on an episode of Saturday Night Live, where he sang "One Dance" and "Hype". On September 26, Drake released a short film on Apple Music, titled "Please Forgive Me", which features several songs from Views.

Composition

The album marks Drake's first full foray into Jamaican dancehall music, after having previously explored the genre in his 2015 mixtape, If You're Reading This It's Too Late. Of the five singles released from Views, three were primarily dancehall songs ("One Dance", "Controlla" and "Too Good"), while elements of dancehall were seen throughout the rest of the album, as in "9" which sampled "Dying" by Jamaican artist Mavado.

Singles

"Hotline Bling" was released as the album's lead single on July 31, 2015, the track was produced by Nineteen85. Despite the song being released as the official lead single for Views, "Hotline Bling" was included as the bonus track on the album.

"One Dance" was released as the album's second single on April 5, 2016. The song features guest appearances from Nigerian recording artist Wizkid and British singer Kyla. Wizkid also co-wrote and co-produced the track. Nineteen85 also produced the song, with co-production by DJ Maphorisa and Drake's longtime collaborator 40. "One Dance" saw the unprecedented success upon its release and became Drake's first number one single on the Billboard Hot 100, topping on the charts in the United Kingdom and Canada.

"Pop Style" was released as the album's third single on April 5, 2016. The song features guest appearances from American hip hop duo The Throne (composed of rappers Kanye West and Jay Z), while the production was handed by Sevn Thomas and Frank Dukes, with additional production by Drake's longtime collaborator Boi-1da, alongside 40. Upon the release, Drake removed The Throne's verses, and then re-recorded his own verses as a part of their replacement verses to this track.

"Controlla" was released as the album's fourth single in the United States on June 7, 2016. The song was produced by Boi-1da, with the co-production by Supa Dups and Allen Ritter, with additional production by Di Genius. The song features a sample of "Tear Off Mi Garment" by Jamaican dancehall artist Beenie Man. The leaked version features a guest appearance from Popcaan, a similar high-profile Jamaican dancehall artist.

"Too Good" was released as the album's fifth single on July 26, 2016. The song features a guest appearance from recording artist Rihanna, while the production was handled by Nineteen85, with additional production by Supa Dups. The song contains a sample of Popcaan's song "Love Yuh Bad".

Other songs

In August 2014, a one-minute-long snippet, called "Views from the Six" was leaked online. The snippet features a verse by Drake over the instrumental, which was later used for the second half of the track, called "U With Me?". However, the lyrics rapped were changed completely. In few weeks before the album's release, two other tracks were also leaked online: "Faithful" featuring Pimp C, and "Controlla" featuring Popcaan. Both of these tracks were included on the album, however, with these changes with additional verse by Dvsn was added to "Faithful" and Popcaan's verse was removed from "Controlla". On September 24, 2016, an extended version of "Faithful" with two additional verses from Dvsn was premiered on OVO Sound Radio. After the release of Views, it was revealed that American rapper Lil Wayne was initially featured on the song, called "Hype". On May 21, 2016, the version featuring Lil Wayne, premiered on OVO Sound Radio. On February 17, 2017, Future premiered an extended cut of the song "Grammys" with additional verse from himself on his radio show, Freebandz Radio.

Critical reception

Views received lukewarm reviews from critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 69, based on 31 reviews. Many reviewers found it overlong and lacking in a cohesive theme, while claiming Drake was not challenging himself artistically; according to MTV's Meghan Garvey, the unenthusiastic response to the record may have been attributed to Drake's "unwillingness (or inability) to significantly evolve beyond his time-tested signature sound, clinging to the comfort of the same frosty 40 beats, zingy aphorisms, and perennial trust issues". Reviewing Views in The New York Times, Jon Caramanica said Drake's "emotional excavations aren't as striking as they were a few years ago, when they had the sting of the new to them." In The A.V. Club, Evan Rytlewski argued that he had "done this before and done it better", describing the album as "too long and stubbornly low energy". Neil McCormick wrote in The Daily Telegraph that in spite of some evocative production and Drake's impressive rapping skills, his continued "navel gazing" demonstrated a lack of emotional maturity and insight. Brooklyn Russell from Tiny Mix Tapes wrote that "for an artist so eager to entertain, so set on proving his superstar status in a fickle industry, he surprisingly doesn't take any risks in order to do something truly different," while observing a "glaring lack of consistency in lyrics, song ideas, and good humor." Andy Gill of The Independent was more critical, panning the album as "utterly wearying and unpersuasive" while declaring that "rarely has one man moaned quite so much about so little."

Alexis Petridis wrote a largely positive review in The Guardian, arguing that Views "offers a lengthy inventory of miseries, cleverly offset by a sly sense of humour and eclectic sound". He deemed it "compelling evidence that this is the defining pop artist of the moment". In The Observer, Kitty Empire found the lyrical and production detail "pin-sharp", and Mojo wrote that the overly introspective themes were redeemed by Drake's nimble flow and clever sense of humor. NME journalist Nick Levine said his "signature brand of downbeat introspection remains gripping". Los Angeles Times critic Mikael Wood wrote that the record "sets his harshest thoughts about women against the prettiest, most sensual music he's ever made", featuring a number of "deeply beautiful tracks" that "further dismantles whatever barrier was left between rap and R&B following Drake's earlier albums".

Accolades

Views received multiple nominations for the 59th Grammy Awards, including Album of the Year. The album was nominated for Best Rap Album while "Hotline Bling" won for Best Rap/Sung Performance and Best Rap Song, respectively. And the single version of "Pop Style" featuring The Throne was nominated for Best Rap Performance. The album won the award for Favorite Rap/Hip-Hop Album at the 2016's American Music Awards.

Commercial performance

In Drake's home country of Canada, Views sold 110,000 album-equivalent units, and sold 92,000 copies in its opening week. In the United States, Views debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, with 1.04 million album-equivalent units, selling 852,000 copies in its first week of release, and achieving over 245 million streams (despite the album, with the exclusion of its singles released at the time, only available to stream on Apple Music for the first two weeks), more than previous record 115.2 million by Beyoncé's Lemonade (despite that album only available to stream on Tidal). It is the biggest debut since Adele's 25 collected 1.19 million units in its fifth week of release (week ending December 24, 2015). The last album by a male artist to post a bigger pure album sales week was Justin Timberlake's The 20/20 Experience when it debuted with 968,000 copies sold in the week ending March 24, 2013. Views became Drake's sixth consecutive number-one album (fifth as solo artist) on the Billboard 200 and largest sales week. It was the second best-selling album of 2016 in the US, with 1,579,000 copies sold that year.

In the United Kingdom, the album debuted at number one on the UK Albums Chart, with 78,000 sales, becoming Drake's first number-one on that chart. With Views, Drake also joined Adele, Michael Bublé and Taylor Swift as the only artists in the 2010s decade to have an album remain at number one on the Billboard 200 for six consecutive weeks. Overall, Views has attained one billion streams in the United States, according to his record label. As of January 2017, Views has sold 1.61 million recognized copies and a total of 4.14 million album-equivalent units in the United States.

Track listing

Album credits adapted from official liner notes.

Track notes

Sample credits

Personnel

Production