Vinil, Streaming & EPs: Qual O próximo Formato Drake Vai Usar?

Vinyl, Streaming & EPs: What Form Could Drake's Next No. 1 'Album' Take?

This week, Drake rules the Billboard 200 for the second frame in a row, and there's a pretty good chance his new collection More Lifewill continue to be in charge for at least a few turns. This time around, the hip-hop star has conquered the charts with what he and his team have deemed a "playlist project," which is something of a confusing term, as the 22-song item streams (and sells) just like an album. The phrase playlist project may be something Drake made up, but it's worth noting that he has now hit No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with both proper albums and now this playlist. Always one to make history and challenge people's ideas about how music can be consumed, the rapper is surely already working on what will be his next chart-topper, but what form could that collection take?

EP

An EP, or an extended play, is essentially just a short album, and while that doesn't exactly seem to be Drake’s style (his releases are only getting longer and longer), perhaps one day it will be. EPs typically feature fewer than eight or nine tracks, and while they are also often sold at cheaper prices, they don’t usually receive the same media attention or marketing budgets as full albums, so it is very rare for an EP to wind up inside the top 10 on the Billboard 200, let alone at No. 1...but this is Drake we’re talking about. If he could place a serious single on an EP and push the collection with his full might, is there really any wonder if it would be a No. 1? 

Drake introduced himself to the mainstream with an EP entitled So Far Gone which peaked at No. 6 on the Billboard 200, so this is a format he's already familiar with. The set included three top 40 hits, including the No. 2 smash “Best I Ever Had,” and had he been a bigger name at the time, So Far Gone may have charted better. Perhaps he’s moved on from EPs, but should he go back, his fans would surely snap up another one. 

Vinyl

Drake has released a handful of his releases on vinyl, and while those sales haven’t necessarily helped him get to No. 1 on the albums tally just yet, both the rapper and the format are becoming more popular by the day. While vinyl continues to sell more copies every year, it is still difficult to imagine Drake hitting the top of the Billboard 200 with only an LP. The vinyl title with the most first-week copies sold in the past several decades remains Jack White’s Lazaretto, which shifted about 40,000 records in seven days. It’s a rare week when that would be enough to secure the highest position, but perhaps if Drake promoted the title heavily and the price was right on the product, he could be the first person to hit No. 1 with a vinyl-only product since Nielsen began tracking sales in the 1990's. 

Streaming-Only

While he is the king of streaming, Drake hasn’t yet relied entirely on sites like Spotify and Apple Music to get him to the top. His albums may bring in hundreds of millions of plays in just the first week, but they also typically sell hundreds of thousands of copies. Looking at the numbers the hip-hop star has been able to rack up with his last few projects, it is clear that if Drake did decide to go with a streaming-only strategy (at least to begin with), there’s a pretty great chance he could become the first artist to hit No. 1 without selling a single copy.

Compilation

As a member of Young Money, Drake has hit the top 10 twice with compilation records: We Are Young Money and Young Money: Rise Of An Empire, but he has never scored a No. 1. Those albums featured contributions from everybody on the Young Money record label (and their friends), and they grant those artists a top 10 as a part of a group. If he really wanted to, Drake could work with Young Money again to push a new compilation to the highest slot, or he could use the idea to promote his own label, OVO (October’s Very Own) and score a No. 1 with that group of artists. This practice isn’t uncommon in the hip-hop space, though there are only a few labels and groups popular enough to send their wares into the highest tier on the tally.