Drake Heads Into His Hiatus on a Perfunctory Note With Bloated ‘For All the Dogs’: Album Review
variety.comAlex Swhear “Workin’ on a album, now it’s finished,” Drake casually mentions on the album in question, “For All the Dogs.” An unnecessary update, to be sure, but one likely prompted by force of habit: Drake has never taken a meaningful break, perpetually prepping and releasing new music.
Since 2006’s “Room For Improvement,” two years have never elapsed without a major Drake release. Where many of hip-hop’s commercial heavyweights have stepped back — navigating personal struggles (Eminem), retreating inward (Kendrick Lamar), noisily retiring (Jay-Z), or enthusiastically shifting focus to new hobbies, like fashion and anti-Semitism (Kanye West) — Drake has endured as a consistent hitmaker for nearly 15 years, an unprecedented streak.
As such, the news that Drake plans to take a hiatus from music following the release of “For All the Dogs” feels overdue and richly deserved.
So it’s a shame that the album itself is so perfunctory. “For All the Dogs” is less a triumphant victory lap than a deflated slog, a cogent argument for the necessity of a creative reset.
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