‘All the Love I Need is Here at OVO’
For many, OVO Sound is seen as a sweatshop of young, hungry artists that waste their talents on preserving Drake’s career. In reality, the label has curated a roster of talented artists with a coheisve aesthetic.
Ever since Drake and his long-time producer, 40, established OVO Sound in 2012, the record label has been a breeding ground for unknown, Toronto-bred artists. For many, OVO is more of a sweatshop than label, a hit-factory with the sole intent on preserving Drake’s unmatched popularity. This theory is predicated on a number of factors, most notably — Drake’s infamous reputation for being a “culture vulture”, the ghostwriting rumors, speculation that his associated acts have been forced to give up a handful of their own songs for Drake’s benefit, and Drake’s increasing success that has coincided with his proteges’ lack thereof.
Most of this is in fact, conjecture, or rather, misinterpretation. Sure, Drake has been known to “remix” unknown songs, thereby catapulting them into mainstream Hip-hop. And yes, there is evidence that re-affirms the ghostwriting claims. With that said, the argument that Drake takes advantage of his young and hungry writers, is slightly irresponsible.
While OVO’s longest-tenured acts — Partynextdoor & Majid Jordan — are credited with producing and assisting in the writing of five songs (“Hold On We’re Goin’ Home”, “Legend”, “Preach”, “With You”, and “Feel No Ways), tracks that arguably could’ve been career-defining had they released them independently, viewing this collaboration as one that diminishes Drake’s credibility, while preventing his understudies from reaching their full potential, does a disservice to OVO’s big-picture objectives.
Further, this mode of thinking quantifies success soley by the number of chart-topping artists a label households. In the early ’00s, Jay-Z established his label, Roc-A-Fella, by mastering a dynastic mentality. No longer was it about cultivating a signature sound, as it was with Death Row and Bad Boy in the ’90s, rather, the focus was on signing young superstars who would guarantee the label’s longevity.
The ROC set this precedent by signing Cam’Ron and Kanye before each had ascended into superstardom. Lil’ Wayne and Kanye followed suit when creating their own labels. Wayne made Young Money an industry power by discovering Drake and Nicki Minaj; while Kanye established G.O.O.D Music by signing young talent — Kid Cudi and Big Sean.
Hip-hop is so familiar with this blueprint that critics are unable to measure OVO’s success by anything other than its lack of chart-topping artists. Granted, it’s a fair observation, considering that OVO Sound has released a combined five studio albums by its four artists under Drake — PND, Majid Jordan, Roy Woods, and DVSN — all of which have bombed.
For a point of comparison, let’s look at another label with a huge superstar at the helm, Kanye’s G.O.O.D Music. The label’s last five non-Kanye albums, by — Big Sean, John Legend, Designer, Twenty88, and Pusha T — combined to sell 300k copies in their first week, while all of the projects slotted in the top-20 of Billboard’s 200. Meanwhile, OVO’s five non-Drake releases sold a combined 90k copies in their first week, made worse by their embarrasing peak positions on Billboard’s 200 — Partynextdoor (#3 & #15), Majid Jordan (#69), Roy Woods (#127), and DVSN (#133).
Although it’s obvious that OVO Sound has failed to gain traction aside from Drake, the label has accomplished a feat that while overlooked, has been absent in Hip-hop’s modern era — embodying a signature sound.
The seeds that OVO’s encompassing vibe is predicated on, were planted in 2009. After Drake freestyled over Kanye’s “Say You Will” on So Far Gone’s “Say What’s Real”, 40 took notice. In a 2014 interview with HipHopDX, 40 attributes the track to him realizing that it was the place he wanted Drake to sit in, sonically. On 2011’s Take Care, 40 and Drake refined this sound, with the album serving as the moment Drake’s music was recognized by 40’s ambient production. Going forward, it was impossible to seperate Drake’s voice from 40’s drums.
Two years later, the first collaboration between Drake, 40, and then-unknown, Majid Jordan, set the foundation for what would become OVO’s over-arching sound. On 2013’s Nothing Was the Same, this collaboration culminated in “Hold On We’re Goin’ Home.” On the track, 40’s atmospheric production bonded with Majid’s elements of ‘80’s electro-pop, forming a searing underwater feel. With it, 40 and Drake shifted the pop focus into their own center of gravity.
At the time, OVO had recently signed its first artist — PND — an Rap-RnB hybrid that encompassed the wintery vibes of Toronto. With the subsequent signing of Majid, 40 and Drake solidified the label’s big-picture mentality, an approach focused on discovering talented artists who would fit into the already-established mold. Last year, OVO signed its two most recent acts — Roy Woods and DVSN — curating a roster that would continue to fine-tune its signature sound.
In a way, it’s easy to view PND, Majid, Roy Woods, and DVSN as Drake’s muses. With that said, rather than revealing new elements that would steer Drake toward unfamiliar pockets, each artist represents a niche that Drake and 40 have continuously touched on throughout their career. For example, Majid Jordan is built on the electro-pop sound that 40 tapped into as far back as on So Far Gone’s “Let’s Call It Off” and “Little Bit”; PND is a refined and unique version of the airy, RnB-soaked vibes of “Successful” and “Shot For Me”; Roy Woods embodies the minimalistic, new-age RnB that Drake established with “Marvin’s Room” and “Own It”; And DVSN brings to life the ’90s RnB sound that 40 has sampled constantly, specifically on — “Unforgettable”, “Look What You’ve Done”, and “Weston Road Flows.”
However, this is not to say that OVO’s young stars simply refined elements that Drake had previously established, rather that their respective sounds are just as responsible for developing OVO’s trademark vibe, as the breadwinner himself. Perhaps this is the goal that Drake and 40 had in mind, while they cultivated a stable of home-bred artists that represent a coheisve aesthetic.
In retrospect, this may prove to be more lasting than the fleeting success most labels experience by way of a slate of chart-topping solo acts. History shows that this much is true when we measure the legacies of Hip-hop’s defining labels. Besides Death Row, an outlier in that they possessed both a signature sound and a roster of superstars, most of Hip-hop’s greatest labels struggle to sustain a lasting influence. In the grand scheme of things, we remember labels that implemented a ground-breaking sound, more fondly than ones which had a line-up of the hottest rappers. It’s the reason why Bad Boy’s legacy has outlived Roc-A-Fella.
In the late ’90s, with Hip-hop facing an idenity crisis following the untimely deaths of 2Pac and Biggie, P.Diddy and his Bad Boy understudies — Ma$e, 112, and Lil’ Kim — created what would serve as Hip-hop’s signature sound over a four-year period (1997–00), with their ground-breaking, “Bubble-gum Rap.” The Bad Boy sound was rooted in soulful samples laced with the hard-hitting vibe of East Coast Hip-hop. With it, Bad Boy successfully blended Pop and Rap, thereby finding an inhabited niche inside of the genre. Twenty years on, Bad Boy is regarded as one of the most influential labels of all-time — a legacy that is attributed to the Bubble-gum sound as much as the face of the label, Biggie.
Fittingly, OVO appears to be moving toward a Bad Boy-esque approach. Last weekend, the latest rendition of OVO Sound Radio showcased its four biggest acts by debuting their respective new singles — Drake’s “Signs”, Majid Jordan’s “One I Want”, PND’s “Freak N You”, and DVSN’s “Don’t Choose.” It was impossible to listen to each song without observing the clear cohesiveness of it all. Even with four different artists, you could feel the over-arching vibe of Toronto, as the tracks embodied the qualities that have made 40 and Drake’s quest to redefine pop, possible. Commercial success aside, it’s time to take note of OVO’s growing stranglehold on Pop music.
