Take Care

DRAKE

“I would liken myself to Kevin Durant,” Drake said around the release of his second album. “People want him so bad to fall or mess up, but he just consistently delivers.”

The Toronto rapper had released his debut EP and first album, 2010’s Thank Me Later, in less than a year. Then, his rising commercial success meant he had the luxury to spend 17 months perfecting Take Care. “We had a little bit more of an opportunity to stay home this time,” said producer Noah “40” Shebib, Take Care’s chief architect. “We really didn’t have any limits. We could kinda do whatever we want.”

That attention to craft is reflected in Take Care’s plethora of prominent samples, from SWV’s “Anything” to Gil Scott-Heron’s

“I’ll Take Care of You,” and in the album’s artfully blurred song structure: the way “Marvin’s Room” oozes into “Buried Alive/Interlude” and “Cameras” dissolves into “Good Ones Go/Interlude.”

Drake scored a tongue-twisting verse from OutKast’s André 3000 and was even able to nab Stevie Wonder for the melancholy outro of “Doing It Wrong,” an audacious homage to classic soul. “When you really get around him, just the life that he emits, it’s energizing,” Drake said of working with Wonder.

The extra time also meant Drake and Shebib were able to perfect their seamless blend of hip-hop and R&B to the point where they could even switch between the two midsong. R&B was one of the threads that initially connected the two men, who bonded over “everything from SWV and Jon B to Silk and Playa . . . that kind of slow R&B vibe that lasts,” according to Shebib.

When Shebib got the final master for Take Care, he took his car for a spin to play the album and got so moved he began to cry. “It’s the weirdest experience for me,” he told

Rolling Stone. “I’m so emotionally beat up, exhausted, drained, stressed, tired — and then proud and happy that we actually did it.”