Drake’s new house-influenced album Honestly, Nevermind has been dividing opinion since its surprise release last week, but for Irv Gotti, the 6 God’s dance music detour has left him concerned about the future of Hip Hop.
TMZ caught up with the former Def Jam and Murder Inc. executive at the Los Angeles International Airport on Tuesday (June 21), where he shared his honest feelings about Drizzy’s club-oriented direction. According to Gotti, Honestly, Nevermind has only galvanized him to get back in the game and discover a “raw” artist like DMX, JAY-Z or Ja Rule to correct the course of rap.
“Personally, I love Drake,” he said. “I think Drake is a great person, he’s a great human being. But I listened to his album — and Drake can do whatever he wants as an artist … but Drake’s new album is not Hip Hop.”
Drake ‘Honestly Nevermind’ Is Diasporic Pop Music For The Streets, Not The Tweets
When asked if Honestly, Nevermind signals the demise of Hip Hop, Gotti replied, “I hope not! As long as I’m alive, it can never be the demise of Hip Hop. I gotta get back in the game and find me a n-gga. That’s what that album made me feel like. It made me feel like going and finding me a raw new DMX, new Ja [Rule], new Jay[-Z] and serving n-ggas and fucking bringing back great Hip Hop.”
He added, “I just wasn’t expecting a whole album of that shit. He’s too powerful and too strong, and it made me feel like we need another n-gga that’s as powerful and strong that’s gonna stay with this thing called Hip Hop.”
Ironically, Irv Gotti helped usher in the R&B-flavored lane that Drake occupies by overseeing Ja Rule and Ashanti’s run of radio-friendly hits in the late ’90s and early ’00s — a historical fact the TMZ paparazzi reminded Gotti about. “Yeah, but I did Hip Hop,” he replied. “Drake’s new album is not Hip Hop.”
DMX — who Gotti helped sign to Def Jam in 1997, kickstarting one of the most successful partnerships in rap history — wasn’t exactly complimentary of Drake either before his passing last April. In a memorable interview with The Breakfast Club in 2012, the Ruff Ryders legend trashed the Toronto megastar.
“I don’t like anything about Drake,” he said bluntly. “I don’t like his fucking voice, I don’t like none of what he talks about, I don’t like his face, I don’t like the way he walks, nothing. I don’t like his haircut.”
The pair eventually squashed their beef with help from N.O.R.E., with Drake sampling DMX’s 1998 hit “How’s It Goin’ Down” on his Views album cut “U Wit Me?”
Irv Gotti isn’t alone in his distaste for Drake’s new album. The Breakfast Club‘s Charlamagne Tha God gave a brutally honest review of the project last week, describing it as “elevator music.”
“The vibes, to me, are the vibes you hear when you’re at a Beverley Hills luxury hotel,” he said. “This is lobby, elevator music. This is the vibes when you sitting in the lobby of the SLS hotel having some drinks on a leather couch with the lights dimly lit.
“You got a suit on, no tie, first couple of buttons on your shirt open, some slippers on, loafers, no socks. I’m never going to revisit the album again, but if it comes on when I’m in the lobby of a luxury hotel, I’m not mad at it.”
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Not everyone shares that viewpoint, though. J. Cole called Honestly, Nevermind “phenomenal,” while The Roots’ Questlove described it as a “gift.” The narrative only seems to be shifting since the release of Beyoncé’s own house-influenced single “Break My Soul” earlier this week.
“Now that @beyonce just dropped her new single watch how folks give the new
@Drake album another listen,” veteran R&B crooner Raheem DeVaughn wrote on Twitter on Tuesday. “It’s culture a shift house music, soulful house & dance is the wave now hate it or love.”
Stream Honestly, Nevermind below.
The album wasn’t supposed to be hiphop Lol
Yet for some reason this album will be nominated in hip hop/rap categories of music award shows and have millions more believing they’re listening to hip hop music and eventually dilute the pureness of ‘real’ hip hop even further. I don’t like Irv Gotti at all but he’s so right on this one.
Perv Gotti doesn’t get it. Nobody cares to be associated with him anymore. He could even claim to have discovered the second coming of Jesus and people still wouldn’t care. Admit it, it’s over.
AS SOMEONE WHO LISTENS TO ALOT OF DANCE MUSIC IN THE GYM. NOTHING ABOUT THIS ALBUM IS LIT. JUST WEAK MOANING DRAKE VOCALS OVER DANCE BEATS. ALSO FIND IT FUNNY HOW HE WAS TEXAN, WEST INDIAN, AND NOW HES FROM THE JERSEY SHORE? DUDE HAS NO IDENTITY.
First time I agree with Irv but we all know that Drake has nothing to do with Hip Hop nor lyricism as he doesn’t write his own songs neither. I never liked his music but this new album is an overdose of pure garbage…
Few things…Drake never said his album is a rap album. DMX can never be replaced. For all his issues dude reached heights most will never. Ja Rule was a shit rapper who made pop rap power ballads. Jay Z is still alive and should be recognized for trail blazing hip hop showing us what can be done. Irv gotti is washed. Comments like his are embarrassing.
Yet for some reason this album will be nominated in hip hop/rap categories of music award shows and have millions more believing they’re listening to hip hop music and eventually dilute the pureness of ‘real’ hip hop even further. I don’t like Irv Gotti at all but he’s so right on this one.
What’s wrong with house music? It’s not crappy pop music he is making like what k dot and eminem do. It’s a house album that pays tribute to the 90s.
There’s good House albums this is not one of them.
His album is the uber gay type of house music that even die hard fans would rather jump off a cliff then to have to listen to that garbage.
It sounds monotonous…this was my first impression when I listened to the first 6 or 7 songs….Boring.
Man, I miss X. But we not getting another one of him. For anybody who hasn’t already, read his book. A lot of bad, a lot of good, but his story is heavy. One love.
These oldheads need to buy some property on the beach and relax..
Drake has never been rap or hip-hop. He’s an unskilled cornball like that fat fuck Khalid. I’ll go to my grave never understanding what the fuck has happened to rap.
I’ll tell you what happened to rap. They dressed it up in stripper heels and a short skirt and pimped it out like they do everything else that used to be great.
Same irv gotti who put ja rule out?
Facts
Larry Heard and Kevin Saunderson if I want real House music. This album was a hard pass. Not against the new but it is not genuine music. Drake is an opportunist who borrows styles. The producers should be ashamed
Literally everyone in the game is an opportunist that borrows styles….
Irv Gotti music made me want to glue my ears shut so I’d never have to hear that trash again.
That entire camp was slaw
there’s all kinds of dudes making hardcore rap records also freestyle and lyrical rap records as well – mostly they rhyme over loops they cant clear but its not like they arent out there. if he was serious he could find 5 good mcs with proven track records in a week.
If what Beyonce does can make a grown adult like something that Drake does, our problems are bigger than this watered down trash.
The album is literally classified as “dance”, its not hip hop on purpose, idk if irv gets that
Hip-Hop died years ago. Today’s so-called music is straight up garbage!!!
Stop it, Irv. Ja Rule was well on his way to make an album just like this lmfao!
Just give Apollo Brown, Pete Rock, Premier and da Beatminerz a major label budget and airplay…..and hip-hop will be saved.
No comparison with that cheap album to the likes of what Ja and Ashanti were doing…it was still Hip Hop.