Was Drake’s Audience Ready for His Dance-Influenced Album “Honestly, Nevermind”?

The numbers tell only one side of the story.

With the release of his seventh official album, Drake caught fans by surprise, unleashing a 14-track project which is almost entirely house and dance-influenced, save the album’s final cut with 21 Savage. While Drake and his team have pushed the track “Falling Back” hard (it’s featured as the number one track on Spotify’s New Music Friday), if you look at Spotify’s numbers, the most streamed track from the album is actually “Jimmy Cooks” with 21 Savage. Are Drake fans not quite ready for the deviation from classic Drake, the R&B-pop and hip-hop king?

In my opinion, this album isn’t much of a deviation for Drake. His albums are littered with cuts like those from “Honestly, Nevermind” albeit more subtly, as they would typically be the minority among his R&B and hip-hop records. Let’s go through a few: CLB’s “Fountains,” More Life’s “Passionfruit,” Views’ “One Dance,” the list goes on. Sure, some of these records may be more dancehall-influenced than dance-influenced but it’s not like this sound is totally new for Drake. He’s been priming us for a while now, we just weren’t ready for an entire album of these type of tracks.

Watch the video for “Falling Back” below: