Words by Gabriel Spadaccini
With Views maintaining its death-grip hold on the Billboard charts’ number one slot for the fifth consecutive week, Drake is no doubt sitting on top of the world right now.
As if the initial numbers weren’t enough, the 6 god added to the wildly successful album sales with a hard-hitting May promotional run, hosting and performing on Saturday Night Live, dunking on Jimmy Fallon in a late night ‘faceketball’ championship, and being scared shitless during his token interview with American daytime TV host Ellen DeGeneres.
It’s more than anyone else, Drake seems to understand that the internet hype machine feeds on comedy. It’s an attitude that says a lot about him as a person, because the music superstar – who originally got his big break playing high-schooler Jimmy Brooks on the Canadian TV show Degrassi: The Next Generation – is comfortable being laughed at. There’s everything from his poetic introduction of WNBA player Skylar Diggins at the 2014 ESPY Awards, to the time he disguised himself in order to interview city-goers on Jimmy Kimmel, to the torrent memes (the best of which was obviously the Wii tennis nod) following the release of the Hotline Bling video. Even within the upper echelon of the rap game, he’s able to poke fun at himself in good humor, and years after Degrassi, he’s clearly still got that comedic talent up his sleeve.
Sometimes it’s good to go back to the very beginning though, which is why there’s a strong case to watch a recently-surfaced video of Drake performing improv at a Toronto club back in his much younger years. Although the video itself was posted back in March, its recent popularity can be attributed to a Canadian news article detailing the revival of the once-iconic establishment, called The Rivoli. Witnessing a teenaged Aubrey Graham awkwardly cracking jokes and breaking into a song and dance, all while sporting the coolest of afros, we can truly appreciate how far he’s come.
Check out the video below to see Drake before his transformation into Champagne Papi.
