Drake: For All the Dogs - Is just Good (Album Review)

 

Going into this album I was very hyped for a new Drake project. I was truly hopeful that this one was going to redeem Drake after a few okay to mediocre releases in the past few years. Personally I feel like Drakes releases since More Life has been at best "just fine", and some I would even go as far as saying are bad. However the album rollout for all the dogs has been brilliantly done. And with Drake saying that this one was more of a "old-school Drake" with more rapping, I must admit I was excited. 

However, after I saw the official tracklist and I realized the album was 23 songs long, my excitement quickly turned into concern. Generally I believe that there is very few albums that are that long and can keep up a high standard of quality throughout a whole project. Therefore I got worried when I realized Drake once again made a 20 song long album.  

This is a recurring problem that I have with most Drake projects, and For All the Dogs doesn't differ from this. Even though there are some really good and enjoyable songs on here, the album as a whole gets ruined by songs that aren't up to par with the highs on the album. Although there are some great rapping showcased on the album, it definitely feels more like a RnB album. And a considerable portion of the songs come across just bland, with dull singing and uninteresting lyrics. Nonetheless I believe the start of the album is pretty strong, with some good to great songs. That with the exception of the third song "Calling for you", that I definitely think is one of the lows on the album. This song really feels like something that got left out of Her Loss, and for some reason got added to this project. Both Drake and 21 Savage just delivered some simple and uninspired verses, with a very long and annoying rant skit in the middle that ruins the song even more. However the highs on the album are undeniably very good. Personally favorites are definitely "First Person Shooter" and "8am in Charlotte", where Drake showcases great flows and bars, while and J.Cole yet again delivers an incredible feature verse. 

Overall I think the album has very good highs but also lows, which ruins the overall experience and leaves me feeling like the album is just okay or even mediocre. I absolutely stand by my initial thought that this album is too long. If For All the Dogs instead would have been cutdown to about 12 songs, removing the very bland songs. It instead would have been a much more enjoyable listen for me, and I would have considered it being a very good or even great project. 

Going forward I hope Drake takes some time to really craft something special for his next project. Instead of dropping every 6 months and instead go silent for a while like some of his peers and return with something really impressive, which we know Drake can deliver.