While Drake’s 2016 album Views spawned a handful of blockbuster singles, the project as a whole wasn’t nearly as well received as Take Care was. Many Drizzy fans still believe the Toronto rapper’s 2011 sophomore record remains his best work, but Baton Rouge rapper Fredo Bang argued during an interview with Power 105.1’s On The Radar that Views is actually a more well-rounded project.
“So if we judging it we judging it on music alone,” Fredo said. “Which means bars, cadence, melody, production that’s what we judging it on. Now, Take Care don’t get me wrong had a lot of his biggest hits on there stuff like that, but can you name me every song?”
Radar host Gabe P then said he absolutely could name every song on Take Care, but that he didn’t know a lot of the songs on Views.
“Ah man, c’mon man. Views he got the ‘Controlla’ he got these different energies, he got way more different energies. Take Care he had some songs that I never even played. You ain’t play every song on Take Care…I feel like it’s Views I’m sorry.”
Fredo then shouted out Views intro track “Keep The Family Close,” and called the sampling crazy.
However, if Fredo were to ask the man himself, Drake wouldn’t cite either project as his favorite. During his December 2019 Rap Radar sit down with Elliot Wilson and B. Dot, the Toronto icon said Nothing Was The Same remained his favorite body of work.
“That’s my favorite album too…As time progresses, I have a lot of people come up to me and say ‘you know what? I like Nothing Was The Same better than Take Care,” Drake said. “The reason why Nothing Was The Same is my favorite album is because of the fact that it was probably my most concise album, and within that concise offering was a lot of great shit.
Check out the full interview with Fredo Bang below, where he also talks about his new project Two-Face Bang 2, which featured Roddy Ricch, Money Man and Sleepy Hallow.
Views was trash, Take Care had bars
Views was not trash. It’s okay if you prefer Take Care, but that doesn’t mean Views was trash. Both are great. I don’t think any TC song has better bars than Weston Road Flows or views title track. I think Views goes a little deeper and has better replay value. Some TC songs feel like they don’t hit past 2011-2012 (Make Me Proud, Headlines, HYFR, The Motto, Take Care) while others are timeless (The Real Her, Practice, The Ride, Over My Dead Body, Cameras). I also think Drake was pretty flawless incorporating his R&B- pop inspiration and influence into Views. He’s got pop, r&b, dancehall, and hip-hop and none of it feels forced except for One Dance maybe.
Views was trash. It was a boring LP. Sonically, the predominantly dancehall feel of the album seemed forced as though Drake was attempting to further ingratiate himself with the large Caribbean community in Toronto. Lyrically, the rhymes on Views are vastly inferior to TC’s, nor do they match the incredible contrastive, yet synergistic perspectives of self-reflection and emotional depth against vapidity and capitalist gluttony. TC is a masterpiece… Views is a piece of shit.
None of his albums are classics IMO, but NWTS is easily his best overall effort to date.