Today Drake will officially crown himself the current king of not only the rap charts, but moving the needle (both on and offline) with the release of his third album, Nothing Was the Same. The buzz around the rapper, ne Aubrey Graham, has swelled to almost insane levels thanks to Nothing's album art, which was ridiculed; the single "Wu-Tang Forever," which of course pissed off rap traditionalists to no end; and Drake's long-running infatuation with being the rapping/singing pop star du jour.
These are all necessary qualifications for any buzzworthy album, but something else goes without saying -- Drake loves Houston to death. No one man has flown a more appreciative Canuck flag for Houston than Drake, and little reminders of that are all over Nothing Was the Same.
Unlike, for example, A$AP Rocky or a few others who find themselves enamored with H-Town culture, Drake has been in the city enough not only to know established antiques, but inhabitants and then some. He's an honorary Houstonian whether you want to admit it or not.
With that, we open up our NWTS lyric sheet to read every major Houston reference like a seance. Trust us, it goes way beyond "Connect" on these parts.
SONG: "FROM TIME" 1. "Thinkin' bout Texas/ Back when Porsche used to work at Treasures"
Before it started losing its luster thanks to police raids, stories of prostitution and drugs, and so on, Treasures was a pretty popular Westheimer strip club on the Westheimer strip, a few minutes away from the Galleria. We all know our share of Porsche's though, some strip, some go to college and make something of themselves.
While we've never been inside Treasures, we know for damn sure something went on in there to make it a weekly topic on the local news. Oh, if you were using your "Drake Loves Strippers" drinking game there, take a shot.
2. "Or further back than that/ Before I had the Houston leverage"
Let's take it back to 2008, shall we? A year before So Far Gone changed the course of his life, Drake was pretty much like any other rapper -- a kid who wanted to be heard and taken seriously. So, strippers are probably the safest people to having judge-free conversations with, due to the fact that they, well, bare everything on a near-nightly basis.
Three songs into his conversation with Porsche, Drake immediately realizes she may not have his best interests at heart when she says he'll never be bigger than Trey Songz. Come a long way from "Replacement Girl," haven't we?
More Drake, more Houston on the next page.
