Legal name: Aubrey Drake Graham
Wikipedia
Aubrey Drake Graham (born October 24, 1986) is a Canadian rapper and singer. An influential figure in contemporary popular music, he has been credited with popularizing R&B sensibilities in modern hip hop. Gaining recognition by starring as Jimmy Brooks in the CTV teen drama series Degrassi: The Next Generation (2001–08), Drake pursued a recording career in 2006, releasing his debut mixtape Room for Improvement. He followed up with the mixtapes Comeback Season (2007) and So Far Gone (2009) before signing with Young Money Entertainment.
His first three albums Thank Me Later (2010), Take Care (2011) and Nothing Was the Same (2013) were met with critical and commercial success, with their US top-ten lead singles "Find Your Love", "Take Care", "Started from the Bottom", and "Hold On, We're Going Home" helping propel him to the forefront of hip hop. Drake experimented with—and helped popularize the general use of—dancehall and Afrobeats on his fourth album Views (2016), which remained atop the Billboard 200 for 13 non-consecutive weeks—making it the first album by a male artist to do so in over a decade—and featured the global hit singles "Hotline Bling" and "One Dance" (with WizKid and Kyla). Drake followed this with the double album Scorpion in 2018, which contained the US number-ones "God's Plan", "Nice for What", and "In My Feelings", and his sixth album Certified Lover Boy (2021), which set the then-record (9) for most US top-ten hits from one album: its lead single "Way 2 Sexy" (with Future and Young Thug) reached number one. In 2022, he released the house-inspired album Honestly, Nevermind and the collaborative album, Her Loss (with 21 Savage) and his eighth album For All the Dogs in 2023: these contained the number-ones "Jimmy Cooks" (with 21 Savage), "Slime You Out" (with SZA), and "First Person Shooter" (with J. Cole).
As an entrepreneur, Drake founded the OVO Sound record label with longtime collaborator 40 in 2012. In 2013, he became the "global ambassador" of the Toronto Raptors, joining their executive committee and later obtaining naming rights to their practice facility OVO Athletic Centre. In 2016, he began collaborating with Brent Hocking on the bourbon whiskey Virginia Black. Drake heads the OVO fashion label and the Nocta collaboration with Nike, and founded the production company DreamCrew and the fragrance house Better World. In 2018, he was reportedly responsible for 5 percent (CAD$440 million) of Toronto's CAD$8.8 billion annual tourism income. In 2022, he obtained partial ownership of Italian soccer club A.C. Milan.
Among the world's best-selling music artists, with over 170 million records sold, Drake is ranked as the highest-certified digital singles artist in the United States by the RIAA. He has won five Grammy Awards, six American Music Awards, 39 Billboard Music Awards, two Brit Awards, and three Juno Awards. He has achieved 13 number-one hits on the Billboard Hot 100 (14 counting "Sicko Mode") and holds further Hot 100 records, including the most top 10 singles (76), and the most charted songs (321). From 2018 to 2023, Drake held the record for the most simultaneously charted songs in one week (27), the most Hot 100 debuts in one week (22); and held the most continuous time on the Hot 100 (431 weeks). He additionally has the most number-one singles on the R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, Hot Rap Songs, and Rhythmic Airplay charts, and holds the joint-record for most number-one singles by a male solo artist (with Michael Jackson).
Discography
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