Drake & Future - What A Time To Be Alive (September 20, 2015)

Although he’s since diluted his own brand with his prolific release schedule, there was once a time when Nayvadius “Future” Wilburn wasn’t spending the majority of his free time high as shit while trying to figure out which artist he should release a collaborative project with next. Instead, he was trying to hone his craft as one of the founding fathers of what we now refer to as “trap music”, all while declining to capitalize (much) on his connections to Atlanta’s Dungeon Family collective. 2015 saw two joint efforts enter Future’s ever-growing discography, the first being a project fully produced by Zaytoven that hit all of the right notes among the man’s fanatical base.

The second was What A Time To Be Alive, a collaboration with Aubrey “Drake” Graham that was marketed as a mixtape, albeit one that people had to pay for? Yeah, I don’t understand the logic behind that shit either. Just call it an album and we’ll all be on our respective ways, guys.

The genesis of What A Time To Be Alive was a Future track called “Where Ya At”, a Metro Boomin-produced excursion into boasts-n-bullshit that, ostensibly, requested to know the whereabouts of its target audience, I’m assuming (I didn’t research this one all that much). Drake and his new friend Nayvadius stumbled upon what they thought was a natural chemistry, immediately deciding to record a full-length project in secret. And by “immediately”, I, of course, mean “several months later because Future was too high to focus and Drake had strippers to support across America”. Obviously they got around to it, though, lest today’s post be a blank page somehow still littered with Amazon links for no reason.

Rumored for several weeks before being officially confirmed by Aubrey the day before its surprise release, What A Time To Be Alive was met with commercial acclaim (because Drake) and was played out almost immediately upon impact (because Future). Coming in at a scant and downright respectable eleven tracks, What A Time To Be Alive is guided not by either of our hosts, but by producer Metro Boomin, Future’s frequent collaborator who spearheaded the project. Interestingly enough, there are no guests to be found on the mixtape: rather, Future and Drake verbally spar for the majority of the run time, if by “spar” you mean “watch strippers” and by “verbally”, you mean “watch strippers”. Alongside other producers such as Southside and Boi-1da, Metro Boomin fills What A Time To Be Alive with the druggy sound of a Future project, which suits him nicely, while Drake does his best impression of the musical chameleon he believes himself to be, with limited success.

What A Time To be Alive dropped only seven months after Drake’s previous effort, If You’re Reading This You’re Too Late, a project that was also marketed as a commercial mixtape: I’m guessing Aubrey doesn’t like referring to things as “albums” unless there’s some sort of throughline, such as a broken heart or a secret son he doesn’t want to talk much about. Future, however, had saturated the airwaves only two months before with his DS2, which is where that “Where Ya At” song ended up. So it’s understandable if you two avoided this particular project because you believed it would be eleven different versions of that initial collaboration.

And you wouldn’t necessarily be wrong.

1. DIGITAL DASH

What A Time To Be Alive kicks off with Future’s voice over a Metro Boomin and Southside trap beat that is just as likely to stab you to death with its discordant, um, chords as it is to sound decent while driving down the block, and just like that, the main criticism of the project is brought to light: What A Time To Be Alive is a Future project that happens to feature multiple contributions from Aubrey, as opposed to a true collaborative effort. Drake tries his damnedest to sound nimble over the beat, but this is the Nayvadius Wilburn household, and he’s merely a guest that sounds stymied on faster-paced instrumentals than what he tends to select for himself. Wheelchair James tries to sound loosey-goosey, though, dropping references to both Diddy and his probable ghostwriter Quentin Miller, but Future’s drug-induced, druggy, drug-pushing, drugged-out flow dominates “Digital Dash”, and it isn’t even that good of a song in the first fucking place. Sigh.

2. BIG RINGS

Our hosts offer up the illusion of an equal partnership by having Aubrey open “Big Rings”, but all this does is give him the lane he needed to unleash a super-fucking-long, annoyingly irony-free hook that straight-up sucks. The chorus lasts for longer than his lone verse. Nayvadius, whose appeal I still haven’t deciphered even though I do like a couple of his tracks, steals this song, too, but it isn’t a proud accomplishment, as he does so by spouting blunt lines suck as, “I run with kidnappers / I’m talkin’ about kidnappers” while blacking out on lean made with Mello Yello. Metro Boomin’s instrumental had more depth and melody than “Digital Dash”, and at least Drake sounded like he belonged on it, but still, nah.

3. LIVE FROM THE GUTTER

I know rappers love to talk about the struggles they’ve faced as though they’re still dealing with them in the present day, but the existence of “Live From The Gutter” is puzzling to me, as it follows Drake’s own “Started From The Bottom”, which, in telling the exact same story, at the very least implies that he also claims to be no longer “from the gutter”. Regardless, Aubrey sounds the best on here, thanks to instrumental assistance from his own frequent collaborator Boi-1da (alongside Metro Boomin and Southside again), so even though he says nothing remotely believable or of any substance (neither of our hosts do), he at least sounds better than Future. Nayvadius, for his part, comes across as though he recorded his verse in a single take, choosing to leave in the part where he simply stops talking as though he forgot what he was doing for a second, because he thought it sounded cool. It doesn’t. I get that he has his own style, but on “Live From The Gutter” you can almost hear the dollar signs that have taken the place of his pupils.

4. DIAMONDS DANCING

The best beat of the evening hits before the halfway point of the project on “Diamonds Dancing”, which, thanks to producers Metro Boomin, Frank Dukes, and Ritter, sounds like a lean-induced fever dream in a neon-lit strip club directed by Nicolas Winding Refn. Weirdly, Aubrey barely factors on here, even though the music skews far closer to his speed for much of the run time: this is absolutely a Future song, one where he can’t help but sound a bit awkward with his flow, which adds a tiny bit of vulnerability to his performance, which is a strange sentence for me to write, but there it is. Drake is kept to chorus and end-of-song rant duties for the most part, save for the piece within where he demands that his partner get off of her phone and pay attention to him like the misogynist his fans refuse to believe he truly is. All that said, this is a pretty entertaining track, one that has already migrated to my Drake playlist. Will there be another one of those tonight? How the fuck should I know? We’re not even halfway through here.

5. SCHOLARSHIPS

Metro Boomin’s instrumental for “Scholarships” deserved more than to just be wasted on this project: it sounds like the score for a scene in a sci-fi heist movie, specifically the one where it appears that the job may be in jeopardy because of outside factors creeping into the narrative that have already been accounted for, unbeknownst to the audience. If What A Time To Be Alive was really recorded in a mere six days, that rush of quantity over quality shows in the verse from both of our hosts, as neither Nayvadius nor Aubrey seem all that inspired or even happy to be here. “Scholarships” was a frustrating listen: can someone please swipe the instrumental for their own use?

6. PLASTIC BAG

Features a return appearance from who I’ll start referring to as Aubrey Anhedonia, the man who is incapable of experiencing any joy. That’s how he sounds on “Plastic Bag”, ostensibly a song where he and Future are encouraging the strippers in their presence to pick up the cash from the stage and store it all in a (*checks notes*) plastic bag: he come across just as lethargic and depressed about his lavish lifestyle as he does during his cameo on The Game’s “100”, which was released shortly after “Plastic Bag”. He goes so far down the disillusioned path that it’s not a stretch to believe all of the other songs he’s on where he’s all boasts-n-bullshit are merely just examples of his acting skills, since Aubrey was in that field first and all. Anywho, “Plastic Bag” is meh: the Neenyo beat is generitrap, and Future sounds like a children’s toy whose battery is dying, so.

7. I’M THE PLUG

Until Drake sees fit to show his face during the third verse, this is literally just another Future song: Aubrey doesn’t bother ad-libbing or anything during “I’m The Plug”. The Southside instrumental facilitates Nayvadius’ inane chanting during the hook, which, obviously, led to this being one of the more popular tracks off of What A Time To Be Alive, as people never seem to tire of referring to themselves as the “plug”, it seems, even though most of those people probably have no fucking clue what that’s even supposed to mean. As with most Future performances, he sounds both lazy and hazy on here: I still haven’t quite figured out how he became so highly regarded within our chosen genre, and I likely never will. (His prolific nature is a good guess, but if that were the case, shouldn’t Curren$y be mega-famous by now?) Drake, for his part, sounded alright.

8. CHANGE LOCATIONS

As much flack as Drake receives daily for co-opting flows and vernacular from his collaborators, usually those from outside of Canada and the United States, he hasn’t really swiped Future’s style on What A Time To Be Alive, unless one counts that Aubrey Anhedonia persona I fabricated and have since trademarked. This is for the best, as Nayvadius’ double-time druggy flow on “Change Locations” (which harbors a banging Noël beat, no lie) just sounds like he’s slurring all of his words right before he has a lean-induced seizure, and that wouldn’t be a good look for Drake. “Change Locations” is about, in essence and in reality, meeting a bunch of employees of a strip club (so, not just strippers) and convincing them all to meet up at another location to bone after having fucked some of them in said strip club already. Future isn’t one to branch out, subject matter-wise, and Aubrey seems content to just go along for the ride with very little input. Ah well, the beat is good.

9. JUMPMAN

The lead (and only?) single from the project, which inspired Kanye West to swipe both the Metro Boomin beat and the flows of both Drake and Future for his song, “Facts” (at least before the instrumental was altered for its appearance on The Life of Pablo). While ‘Ye used the opportunity to shit-talk Nike while praising Adidon Adidas for taking a chance on his Yeezys, Aubrey and Navaydius had larger ambitions: if “getting their fans excited about a collaborative album” was their goal, they succeeded, even though “Jumpman” is the only track off of What A Time To Be Alive that truly sounds like a joint effort. Look, I’m not immune to the charms of reciting the inane hook: I remember bar-hopping downtown once when the song dropped, drunkenly rapping along to the chorus as a deejay blasted it loudly from one of the speakers positioned outside. It’s fine for what it is: it just isn’t all that much. And yet, it’s enjoyable enough in certain settings.

10. JERSEY

Both Drake and Future get a solo track on What A Time To Be Alive, and they were kind enough to lump them together toward the end of the project. Navaydius goes first, and immediately resorts to his shtick that causes me to mentally block his verses from my vicinity. The Metro Boomin and Southside beat was okay, like a trap version of a Disney score, but Future’s flow runs together so much that it’s hard to understand the man, and I grew up with Bone Thugs-N-Harmony and Twista. Maybe I need to be high as shit to appreciate his music? I strongly doubt it, as “Jersey” was bland as hell.

11. 30 FOR 30 FREESTYLE

By far the most lyrical effort of the evening appears on the Drake solo track “30 For 30 Freestyle”, on which he does another one of those “crazy long verse over minimalist instrumental backing” that he always tacks onto the end of his own projects. When I say “lyrical”, I’m not implying that Aubrey rewrites the rules of hip hop or anything, though: this is Drake merely spilling his thoughts, a lot of which happen to rhyme. Noah “40” Shebib’s beat is too basic for my liking, but Drake sounded alright, even if his bars about paternity tests sound a bit ominous now. As the only track that features absolutely no Future participation, it works, but when stacked up against Aubrey’s own catalog, it doesn’t exactly hold its own, but it’s likable enough. Still happy this is finally over, though.

FINAL THOUGHTS: What A Time To Be Alive is a Future album through and through. Let’s not get it confused: Drake is a passenger on here, content with the duties of reading the road signsand billboards out loud while occasionally changing the song playing on the Bluetooth-enabled stereo in the rental while the duo drive from Atlanta to Toronto haphazardly. The overwhelming presence of Metro Boomin on here all but confirms this theory. The thing is, Drake is a dude who is comfortable enough with his A-list status (he’ll always be a bigger name that Future, no question about it) that he’s more than willing to share the spotlight, so while his name on the marquee may have driven ticket sales, he’s happy to let Future steal the show. That’s quite the admirable trait within our chosen genre, and I’m not being sarcastic. What that means, though, is that What A Time To Be Alive is Future’s album to lose, and with the vast majority of this project sounding rushed (this mixtape was allegedly recorded in just six days, remember) and indifferent, it ends up being a waste of everyone’s time to be alive. I did like some of the production on here: without Future or Drake cluttering up the process, those instrumentals could have scored some very interesting ideas. But Aubrey, in his attempt to be humble, instead turns in performances that position him as a man who just can’t be bothered with any of this shit, while Future throws in random (and possibly freestyled) verses that don’t lend the mixtape any sense of cohesion or even organization. To be fair, those of you two who enjoy What A Time To Be Alive aren’t listening to it for lyrical wizardry: you want something to listen to in the strip club, or while you’re high as shit, or while you’re attempting to hit on a woman at the bar without violating her personal boundaries because that’s what you’re supposed to do, you dumb motherfucker. But that doesn’t mean this couldn’t have been better. Both Drake and Future fans can happily skip this entry in both of their respective catalogs.

BUY OR BURN? There’s no need to ever spend money on this project, but if you want something to play in the background while you’re trying to square away a work presentation or a term paper or something, you could do worse than to stream it. The less attention paid to it, the better, though.

BEST TRACKS: “Diamonds Dancing”; some of the beats on a few other tracks are pretty great as well

-Max

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I have nothing more on Future, which leaves him available for Reader Reviews (hint, hint), but you can read up some more on Aubrey Anhedonia by clicking here.