I heard this song in the car this morning and I really liked it and not just because the DJ on Power 99 had a lisp and pronounced it Thuccessful by Drake and Trey Thongthz. The first thing that hit me was the minimal beat, a simple snare drum repeating, punctuated by a very audible bass drum (or whatever since they're not really drums at all but electronic pulses) that is, because of the sparseness of the beat, noticeable, not just an invisible force making your rearview mirror buzz. On top of the beat is a spectral hum of synthesized keyboard playing only a few notes over and over. Added to that are just some sung notes and then the lyrics.
The song (if it gains real popularity and even somewhat if it doesn't) represents a change in recent hip hop music. Sure as the air coming through my window is changed from what it was just a couple days ago, colder, darker, preparing me for the cold bite of winter nights, a season away from the balmy august summer weather we were experiencing just a couple days ago Successful is miles away from the indistinguishable music I hear on the radio. Don't get me wrong, the song is a commercial one, comprising many of the same themes we hear in hip hop all the time, but looked at in a different way. Successful is not the banger track of the summer, it is the reflective song of the colder months when we have time to sit alone in our rooms and think, not exhibit ourselves in the heat of a summer.
The chorus, sung in a truly emotional, plaintive voice, is as follows: I want the money/money and the cars/cars and the clothes/the hos/I suppose/ I just wanna be/I just wanna be successful.
A minor "sport" is Greyhound dog racing. Unlike horses, Greyhounds do not have a jockey to guide them around a circle, instead there is a mechanical rabbit attached to a pole that is meant to lure the dogs around a circular track. The dogs try to catch the rabbit, which is always in front of the them and goes just a little bit faster than they can. The first dog wins the race. Here's a video if you can't picture it. Skip to like 25 or 30 seconds.
Dog Racing from MattFM on Vimeo.
If a greyhound ever catches the rabbit or is able to experience it otherwise, it learns that the lure isn't real and it doesn't want to race anymore. Once it learns that that which it chases is false it loses the desire to chase.
Drake says, "I want it all that's why I strive for it," and then goes on to define what success is: money, cars, clothes, hos. But he isn't sure that that is success, he "supposes" it is. Or is he just "supposing" that he wants to be successful? Once he attained those things would he feel fulfilled? Are those things actually what success is? I think Drake mighta found the rabbit. Or maybe he is close, kind of questioning the rabbit. Drake has by now, I'm sure, attained that which he supposes success is. But the "suppose" in the lyrics indicates that Drake isn't sure that he will be happy or fulfilled if he attains "success." Otherwise the song would go "I am certain I want to be successful." Maybe money, clothes, cars, hos, etc. doesn't actually make you happy. It could be that they make you less happy. Consumption is the goal of so many people in this country (and I assume others too but I haven't been to em) and why are so many people unhappy? Does stuff really make you happy? Is owning things the way to fulfillment?
I go with no. Kinda sounds like Drake might agree with me. Why is there a term called midlife crisis? When people who have always been chasing the rabbit in front of them catch it in middle age after decades of working, building up a resume, accrue evrey thing they have thought would give them fulfillment, and then, what? Nothing? When we are in high school you work hard so that we can go to a good college because, of course, a good college degree will put us ahead of the rest of the population, give us an advantage. And when we are in college we work hard so that we can get into a good graduate school or medical school or law school or business school, because that will differentiate us from the rest of the population. We will get a good job and make money and be able to afford cars and clothes, or whatever you are into. And that's gonna work? We are constantly upgrading our objects but we are not constantly getting happier. I thought it was interesting to hear a rap song with this message, if that is at all the message that Drake was trying to make, which honestly I doubt. But that's what art is, the viewer finds their own meaning. Wait is that what art is? What is art?
my mom sent me that postcard.
ReplyDeleteits funny.
no?
I listened to this song for the first time in the back seat of a car on sunday night, pretty stoned, and couldn't stop laughing. I thought it was the silliest song I'd heard in a while, with a very strained, simple chorus. The guy driving got pretty offended at my laughter and changed the song.
ReplyDeleteBut it's pretty cool to get this dissection of the song from you. I guess I'll listen to the song again and see if there is something more than a catchy chorus with every man's simple pleasures being listed.