Quick Verdict
Take Care arrived on November 15, 2011, and immediately established Drake as the most commercially dominant and emotionally vulnerable voice in mainstream rap. His second studio album is the record on which every element of his artistic identity reached its peak simultaneously: the singing-rapping hybrid at its most fluid, the emotional confessional at its most disarmingly direct, and the production at its most atmospherically immersive. It debuted at number one with 631,000 first-week copies and went six-times platinum in the US. It won the Grammy for Best Rap Album. Rolling Stone ranked it #36 on their 2023 all-time list. “Marvins Room,” “Take Care,” “Headlines,” “Over My Dead Body,” and “The Motto” define an era. It is the finest album Drake has ever made. Rating: 9/10.
At a Glance
| Category | Verdict |
|---|---|
| Overall Rating | 9/10 |
| Best Song | "Marvins Room" |
| Weakest Song | "Look What You've Done" (great but less replayable) |
| Best Feature | Rihanna |
| Best Beat | "Over My Dead Body" |
| Main Sound | Ambient R&B Rap / Toronto / Sad Boy Era |
| Replay Value | Very High |
| Recommended For | Drake at his creative and commercial peak |
Album Details
| Detail | Info |
|---|---|
| Artist | Drake |
| Album | Take Care |
| Release Date | November 15, 2011 |
| Label | Young Money / Cash Money / Republic |
| Producers | 40, Boi-1da, Noah "40" Shebib, T-Minus, Kanye West, Chase N. Cashe |
| Featured Artists | Rihanna, Nicki Minaj, Lil Wayne, Rick Ross, Andre 3000, The Weeknd |
| Number of Tracks | 18 |
| First Week Sales | 631,000 (debuted #1) |
| Grammy Awards | Best Rap Album (2013) |
| Rolling Stone Ranking | #36 all-time (2023) |
| Final Rating | 9/10 |
Context: The Album That Defined a Generation
Drake — born Aubrey Drake Graham in Toronto, Ontario — had released Thank Me Later (2010) as a commercially successful debut that established his singing-rapping hybrid but did not fully realise its potential. Take Care was the record on which his producer Noah “40” Shebib’s ambient, atmospheric production aesthetic achieved its full expression: wet, reverb-heavy, late-night productions built from sampled vocals, chopped R&B, and drum patterns of unusual restraint that gave Drake’s confessional delivery maximum emotional space. The album’s thematic territory — romantic vulnerability, success anxiety, relationships that fame complicates, the specific melancholy of achieving everything you wanted and still feeling incomplete — was entirely new as the primary subject matter of commercially dominant rap. “Marvins Room,” recorded as a single voice memo of Drake drunk-dialling an ex, is the album’s emotional centre and its most formally radical track: a six-minute confession over a near-silence that had no commercial precedent. The Weeknd’s contributions to the album’s sonic palette — “Crew Love,” “Take Care” — gave it its most nocturnal and atmospheric dimension. Rolling Stone ranked it #36 all-time in their 2023 list.
Track-by-Track Review (Key Tracks)
| Track | Quick Review |
|---|---|
| Over My Dead Body | The album's most perfectly constructed opener. A Chaka Khan sample under Drake's most controlled and confident declaration of self. Sets the album's emotional register with precision. Essential. |
| Shot for Me | Drake at his most unguardedly romantic and melodically direct. A production of near-ambient warmth under a verse about watching a former partner move on. One of the album's most emotionally precise performances. Essential. |
| Headlines | The album's most competitive and declaratory track. A T-Minus production of considerable energy under Drake's most confidently assertive verse. One of his finest pure rap performances. Essential. |
| Crew Love (ft. The Weeknd) | The Weeknd's hook introduces his most commercially accessible performance before his own solo breakthrough. The production is the album's most nocturnal and atmospheric. Essential. |
| Take Care (ft. Rihanna) | Rihanna and Drake's most emotionally charged collaboration. A Jamie xx production that gives the track its most formally sophisticated ambient dimension. Essential. |
| Marvins Room | The album's greatest and most formally radical track. A near-silence production under Drake's most unfiltered drunk-dial confession — six minutes of emotional exposure without precedent in commercially dominant rap. Essential. |
| Buried Alive Interlude (ft. Kendrick Lamar) | Kendrick's verse is the finest guest performance on the album — a meditation on the cost of ambition that uses burial as an extended metaphor. A formal declaration by both artists that they understood the other's significance. Essential. |
| Look What You've Done | Drake's most personally vulnerable track — a voicemail from his mother and a verse about his uncle's death that gives the album its most genuinely private emotional moment. Less replayable than the surrounding material but among its most important performances. Essential. |
| Lord Knows (ft. Rick Ross) | Rick Ross brings the album's hardest and most street-focused energy. A Boi-1da production that contrasts with the album's more ambient material. Essential. |
| The Motto (ft. Lil Wayne, Tyga) | The album's most commercially infectious track and the song that introduced "YOLO" to the cultural vocabulary. Lil Wayne's verse is his finest on any Drake record. Essential. |
Final Verdict and Rating
| Category | Score |
|---|---|
| Production | 10/10 |
| Lyrics | 8.5/10 |
| Flow & Delivery | 9.5/10 |
| Features | 9.5/10 |
| Cohesion | 9.5/10 |
| Replay Value | 9/10 |
| Overall | 9/10 |
Take Care is Drake’s finest album and the record that most completely defined the emotional and sonic landscape of early-2010s commercial rap. “Marvins Room” is the most formally radical track in his catalogue. The production scores a perfect 10 — Noah ‘40” Shebib’s ambient aesthetic at its most atmospherically immersive. Rolling Stone ranked it #36 all-time. The Grammy was deserved. A cultural document as much as an album.
Final Rating: 9/10
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Take Care Drake's best album?
Take Care is widely considered Drake's finest album. Rap Reviews Daily rates it 9/10. It won the Grammy for Best Rap Album in 2013 and Rolling Stone ranked it #36 all-time across all genres in their 2023 list. Production scores a perfect 10.
What are the best songs on Take Care?
The five essential tracks are: "Marvins Room," "Take Care," "Headlines," "Over My Dead Body," and "Crew Love." Marvins Room is the album's most formally radical track and the most emotionally unguarded performance in Drake's catalogue.
Who produced Take Care?
Take Care was primarily produced by Noah "40" Shebib, Drake's longtime collaborator from Toronto. 40's ambient, reverb-heavy aesthetic — wet productions built from sampled vocals and restrained drum patterns — is the defining sonic quality of the album. Additional contributions came from T-Minus, Boi-1da, Kanye West, and Chase N. Cashe.
What is the rating for Take Care?
Rap Reviews Daily rates Take Care a 9/10. Production scores a perfect 10. It is Drake's finest album, Rolling Stone's #36 all-time, and the Grammy-winning record that defined a generation of commercially dominant emotional rap.