“Lose You” is Drake’s first big swing at damning his detractors, after years of subtle jabs.
You can’t deny the talent. No matter what you say about Drake, the aforementioned statement is almost always attached to any artistic discourse surrounding Aubrey Graham - for argument’s sake, the biggest pop star of this generation. On “Lose You,” Drake’s then-suppressed feelings of the past few years are pushed to the forefront. As he laments in the first verse, he needs to “be open with people I need some closure with.”
Indeed, Drake first broke the fourth wall in 2013 on Nothing Was The Same’s “Pound Cake / Paris Morton Music 2,” produced by Boi-1da, but it wasn’t until “Lose You” on More Life that the 6 God laid all of his cards on the table. On the former, with bars of the perspective of an artist that executed their plan to make it to a T, Drake let his predecessors know that he isn’t ignoring his success: “Tables turn, bridges burn; you live and you learn / With the ink I could murder, word to my n***a Irv / Yeah, I swear sh*t just started clicking dog / You know it’s real when you are who you think you are.” For an encore, Drake doubled down on the B-side track “Paris Morton Music 2” as well. “Look, f*ck all that ‘Happy to be here’ sh*t that you want me on / I’m the big homie, they still tryna lil bro me, dog.”
Circling back to “Lose You,” produced by 40, Drake sets the stage for a four-minute confessional - reminiscent of his AM / PM series - by incorporating audio from the opening scene of the 1966 documentary Satan’s Choice, directed by 40’s dad, Donald Shebib. “I don’t care what society thinks,” an undefined man says. “They’re nothing anyway. They’re no better than me. Out there, you just have to fit into a pattern that someone’s already laid out for you.” By the song’s end, Drake manages to humanize himself, an artist many considered a bulletproof machine until his run-in with Pusha T a year later.
With the carefully selected monologue to open the track, Drake knows he’s in a class of his own. The 6 God can’t relate to anyone and no one understands.
Strategically placing “Lose You” on More Life opposed to Views or Scorpion helps convey Drake's sympathetic tone. Since this is the first clear-cut track devoted to his detractors, Drake sequencing “Lose You” on any tracklist other than the jubilant More Life may have led to those lazy takes calling him ingenuine. It helps that “Can’t Have Everything” follows, which builds on the themes rapped on “Lose You” and establishes a specific mood midway through the “playlist.”
The narrative of “Lose You” is isolated from most of the playlist’s other tracks. Perhaps, Drake wants you to know how serious he is and that he won’t convey his thoughts to you like this very often. “Lose You” is Drake telling those he met along the way that he’s sorry for how they perceived his actions on his way to the top, but that he’s not sorry for the actual actions. While Drake states he’s in it “for the glory, not the honor mention,” he questions his peers that just aren’t him, “How you forget to fill up with gas on the road to riches?”
Like a recent college grad ready to take over the world, Drake’s peers couldn’t avoid simple pitfalls to ensure their longevity. “Too overly ambitious, too late to fix it,” Drake raps. “Too late for condolences when it’s over with / I need to start sayin’ sh*t when I notice it / Be open with people I need some closure with / Be honest with myself and take ownership.”
Basically, if you move too fast, you’ll crash and burn. We’ve all been there, you get your first career-focused job - after high school, college, etc - and you start to press, you want all of the responsibility right away. Remaining cognizant that you actually have to prove yourself, though, determines how much responsibility you get. Being “too overly ambitious” can work in the right environment, but in my case, it led to a setback.The only thing left was wondering, is it truly “too late to fix it?”
Luckily, actually proving yourself has a way of settling all scores.
Drake, unlike his peers, carried out a slow burn as he ascended to the top - it wasn’t until his third full-length project that he established himself as here to stay - a title he’s yet to relinquish. While Drake sacrificed personal relationships to get to where he is, he played his role with every small victory he earned until it was time to parlay that into the top slot, staying under Wayne for as long as he had to.
Ironically, in a lot of ways, Drake comes to terms with the fact that he could’ve still made it and developed those relationships along the way. Indeed, Drake has an epiphany that much of his self-worth was tied to a perception of what the top is, and when he actually got there, not much changed except the universal validation. Point is, outside validation means nothing, especially if the people that actually know you now think you’re a d*ck based on how you went about making it.
It’s kind of like a determined college kid doing everything in his power to get a job in the music industry post-graduation, which means bridges were unintentionally burned along the way: “Better attitude, we’ll see where it gets me / I know catchin’ flies with honey is still sticky / I wrote the book on world-class finesses and tasteful gestures and making efforts … I know I deserve more, I just never said it."
In the time between verses, Drake realizes that, for him, it isn’t too late to fix the relationships he left by the wayside. However, he recognizes that losing contact with some people was for the best, “I need to start saying sh*t when I notice it / Be open with people I need some closure with.”
Each verse on “Lose You” could be its own song. While the first verse paints the picture of an artist with a void inside, the second verse shows a braggadocious-but-honest Drake. Look, Drake tries to exclaim, it’s not the 6 God’s fault that he’s successful - Drake’s detractors hate the idea of Drake, not Drake himself. More on this in a minute.
While Drake asks if he’s lost you on the hook, he spends the second verse trying to lose his detractors. “Winnin’ is problematic / People like you more when you workin’ towards somethn’ - not when you have it / Way less support from my peers in recent years when I get established / Unforgvin’ times but f*ck it, I manage / Why is my struggle different than others?”
We’ve all been there, too - established our goals, created a timeline, and executed. With that said, not everyone’s path to success is perceived to be hard. Drake grew up as a Black suburban kid in Canada with a white mom; right or wrong, certain people will almost always never respect his come-up. Though his upbringing was based on external factors beyond Drake’s control, he’ll always be perceived by some as having it easy.
As a fellow Black suburban kid, I can attest to the fact that the idea of anyone “having it easy” is a common misconception. Even when someone is presented with amazing opportunities, it’s on the individual to succeed - something I personally dropped the ball on. That said, being put into an amazing opportunity is often the only part of the journey that people see - not the only part of the journey.
As Drake attempts to humanize himself and convey that everyone has their own struggles, he slips into a truth serum moment. It’s Drake at his most vulnerable since “Paris Morton Music.” What do you see when you see me? / When did all the things I mean from the bottom of my heart start to lose meaning? / Maybe I share it with too many people; back then, it used to feel like our secret / Back when I would write and not think about how they received it / I be tryna manifest the things I needed / … How they go from not wanting me at all to wanting to see me lose it all?”
“Lose You” works because the artist that once spit “diss me and you’ll never hear a reply for it” has grown in this four-minute confessional. As anyone who attended therapy will tell you, suppressing your feelings only holds you back and ultimately prevents you from moving forward. Perhaps knowing that, Drake is ready to tie up his loose ends on “Lose You.” For an artist that critics said never evolved early on in his career, “Lose You” symbolizes Drake’s growth as an artist, but more importantly as a person.
By the time it’s time to transition to “Can’t Have Everything,” one genuinely understands Drake better than ever. “Lose You” successfully paints Drake in a different light - if only for four minutes. “Lose You” is the realization that no one deserves to be judged. As Drake said in “4PM In Calabasas,” “I tried to make the right choices with the world watching.”
So, here’s to every misunderstood person out there. Here’s to every successful person still fighting demons that people on the outside won't ever understand or witness [Money only solves money problems - not mental health problems]. Here’s to Drake’s scenic lyrics for vividly painting the hypocrisy he faces. Here’s to new chapters in life, and, at the risk of sounding cliche, here’s to More Life.
Acknowledging some people had to be left, while some relationships need to be saved; Drake’s greatest attribute on “Lose You” is that he’s human like everyone else.
NOTE: An earlier version of this story included a misspelling of jubliant, written as joybulant.
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