Drake’s “In My Feelings” is easily the best song on Scorpion
Why is Drake so good at making bounce music?
Scorpion is a weird album that finds Drake at times doubling down on his corniness (see the extremely dumb indictments of women who use social media) and at other times breaking character completely. It's also an extremely long album; in fact, it takes a whole 20 songs to get to the best part of the album, "In My Feelings."
The song — produced by longtime internet rap fave TrapMoneyBenny, New Orleans legend BlaqNmilD, and 40 — is the second of two bounce songs that appear on the album. Over an unmistakeable brown beat, Drake addresses multiple women in his signature croon, asking for ride-or-die fealty. When compared to "Nice For What," the song stays truer to its influence: the drum pattern is largely unaltered and the Magnolia Shorty sample that leads into the breakdown is tailor-made for ass shaking. Even Drake's own voice is spliced up — it sounds like he actually made a bounce song as opposed to pilfering bounce to make a Drake song.
Like many of Drake's best songs, "In My Feelings" also co-signs an up-and-coming act: Miami rap duo City Girls, who steal the show with a highly quotable bar. Unfortunately, one half of the group, JT, reportedly turned herself to authorities over the weekend to serve a sentence for fraudulent credit card charges. "Did more than I thought I could imagine in this short period of time out on bond," she wrote on her Instagram Story. Now it's time for me to knock this down and come back strong forever." JT is set to be released on March 21, 2020, according to Billboard.
The song ends with a sample from an episode of Atlanta that takes place at Drake's house. We hear Van, Zazie Beetz's character, say, "I don't even care, I need a photo with Drake because my Instagram is weak as fuck." It's strange to hear Drake, on the one hand, using the social media-obsessed woman archetype as a reason he hid his child from the world (the world from his child, whatever), and, on the other, celebrating it as it lends to his ubuiqity. The latter fits way better on him.