“ Ghost writing rumors turn you into a ghost?“, Drake said in the song, referring to when Meek Mill accused him of using ghost writers. In the song, Drake displays his dominance in the rap game, while also referencing his beef with US rapper Meek Mill. More Life opens up with the song “Free Smoke”, which starts with a sample of Nai Palm’s vocals from her song “Building A Ladder”. The album is titled after a Jamaican slang phrase, which means to wish someone well, and the cover art of the album features a photo of Drake’s father Dennis Graham, which was taken in the 1970’s, while the album comes with production from the likes of 40, Boi-1da, Kanye West, Murda Beatz, and PartyNextDoor. Not only did More Life get named as the best album of 2017 by a number of tastemakers, it also charted at #1 on the US BillBoard 200 album chart. The “album” includes a variety of genres including R&B, grime, trap and afrobeats. With More Life made up of 22 songs, Drake also considers this a playlist rather than an album or even a mixtape.
In the sunniest vision of the future, playlists offer a future where labels, streaming services, and artists all share the power and money in the room, even though there might not be that much of it to go around.On the 18th of March, 2017, Canadian rapper, singer and songwriter Aubrey Graham, popularly known as Drake, released his sixth mixtape and tenth overall project More Life. The rise of playlists could be the thing that gives streaming platforms an important advantage over labels, or it could be a final straw for labels who decide to pull the access to their music. The question remains of how much power Spotify, Apple, and their rivals can hold on to as they negotiate and renegotiate their access deals with labels. It’s not hard to imagine how More Life’s playlist model could evolve in the future - seeing an album come together in real time via frequent updates or artists including songs by their peers in their projects without having to worry about label conflicts. More Life could perhaps be seen as the beginnings of a new template for this maturing era of digital distribution an artist-driven format for churning out the level of content that being a relevant artist in the streaming era demands. It took hardware, like cheap MP3 players and the iPod, to make everyone stop buying CDs, but 99 cent song downloads made sure those players got filled with music. Later, the digital revolution of the ‘00s transferred that tremendous power to Apple and helped open the door for artists to ditch the label system entirely. The major labels’ stronghold on the music industry made artistic independence almost an impossibility. In the ‘80s, the ascent of the CD cemented the power of labels: they could sell music in a cheaply manufactured format for far more than it cost to make. It’s just more stuff for fans to put on their own playlists. The streaming model has rewarded those, like Drake and Future, who crank out content consistently. There’s been 39 episodes of his bi-weekly radio show on Beats 1, including Saturday’s ultra-tweetable premiere of More Life.
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Since 2015, Drake has given the world 70 official songs across four albums, plus lent his voice to a countless number of songs for other streaming heavyweights like Rihanna, Future, and Nicki Minaj. Some have called the album’s 22-strong tracklist too long, but providing fans with more content, not less, is at the core of Drake’s strategy.