The first sign that Drake actually pulled his comeback off? The music videos. Great, distinct, rich visuals, nearly 20 of them, from an artist who is typically extremely hit-or-miss in this area (give or take an “HYFR” and that time Karena Evans took over creative duties for an entire album rollout). But it’s deeper than thinking back to “Energy” or the limp short film that accompanied Views; just last summer Drake tried to jumpstart his Iceman rollout with a series of ambitious but increasingly conceptually-laborious livestream “episodes,” and the thematic vision (or lack thereof) for this album seemed concerning.
I was expecting more bullshit like Drake personifying his 2024 beef loss as Pinocchio killers chasing him around Europe but instead, Iceman Episode 4 is more of a visual album of loosely connected videos. Despite being in Europe myself for the stream’s 9:45 ET drop, I’m glad I woke up for it; the unified visuals made the new music hit even harder, their cohesion and range—from thermal imagery, to explosion-porn, to an animated interlude—was almost as infectious as the fun Drake himself is clearly having in them. (Hats off to Drake’s longtime collaborator Theo Skudra, who helmed all of these and whose powers have been growing steadily since he made the leap from Drake’s photographer/videographer to his go-to director.)
Take “Burning Bridges,” which kicks off with a one-take tracking shot through a restaurant that floats upstairs to a private room where Drake and the OVO boys are turning up to the track, their diegetic chants of the refrain (“where she at?!”) and goofy peekaboo dance to go with it only adding to an already great vibe. (The chants definitely should’ve made the final CDQ.)
But key in on what Drake’s actually saying in that catchy hook, and the smiling and nodding might give way to a furrowed brow. It’s hard not to do a double-take at lines like “I put you n-ggas through the wringer/You gettin bodied by a singin’ n-gga.” It sure sounds great, with Drake employing a hypnotic, Kodak Black-on-“Skrt” flow, and the reflexive lore callback to an old Drake classic (one of several on Iceman) is good nostalgia bait, but Drake—weren’t you the one who was put through the wringer? Who exactly did he body if he’s the only one in a position of having to come back? Throw him some bail and say this specific song is for A$AP Rocky (one of many people not named Kendrick that Drake did mostly get the better of on his diss track “Family Matters”), and the central thesis seems to be that Rocky and Rihanna (or whoever) must not be on solid ground because she… didn’t post his new music on her Instagram page. This is the dumbest, most sophomoric line of thought, since, well, “Why is she following Dave Free and not Mr. Morale?”
Ninety percent of Iceman is Drake re-litigating The Beef. A couple of songs addressing fallouts, betrayals, reflection, etc. is fair, but a whole album? I can’t put it better than one tweet I saw: “you not supposed to let n-ggas know they bothered you this much.” It’s to the point that when Big Ice tries to flex as if he’s too cold to be affected elsewhere in the music, he doth protest too much. Admitting summer 2024 was a dark time? That’s good stuff. But Drake can’t commit to accepting his positioning, and as such the content is filled with contradictions. At the beginning of the album he boasts that he can’t remember one rap from Kendrick, certainly not from his diss onslaught—the rest of the project proceeds to reference lines and jabs from virtually each Kendrick diss. He even names the blockbuster olive-branch reunion with Future after one of the most viral lines in “Not Like Us.”
Virtually every track is comprised of either snarling, why-I-oughta raps about all the things he could’ve and should’ve done at the beef’s peak, or worse, stop-the-count raps where he flat-out refuses to acknowledge that he “lost.” It’s overkill. Did DeMar DeRozan’s Pop Out and Not Like Us cameos really warrant an entire song? Take a shot for every seething bar aimed at nameless “pussies” across the album, and you’re meeting Biggie before the outro. The p-word is Ice’s favorite epithet but sadly, he can never get it off convincingly; his chest is puffed up, but he’s blowing out hot air. “Whisper My Name” goes crazy until you remember his name was uttered quite clearly on national television. Later on the album Drake references the Super Bowl, wishing he could wipe Kendrick’s “smug look off of his face.” There are no lines on here worthy of making Kendrick pause his park push-ups to record a response, only confirmation that Kenny got under Iceman’s skin.
