complex.com/music/2020/06/40-talks-the-weeknd-drake-take-care

The Weeknd contributed to a number of tracks on Drake's fan favorite album Take Care, but Noah "40" Shebib says it's a misconception how much the "Blinding Lights" singer worked on the record. In a new interview with Rolling Stone, the OVO hitmaker addressed The Weeknd's role in Take Care, pointing out how his contributions tend to be over exaggerated by some fans.

"There’s, like, 22 songs on Take Care. He contributed on four of them," 40 said. "There are 18 other songs on there where that guy was nowhere to be found, right? So it’s like, ‘Yeah, cool and you contribute to a few records on Take Care. Significant records, sure, but it was a few. It wasn’t a lot.’ It’s a common misconception. I made that whole album. I saw Abel maybe two days. I was in there for like a year."

Take Care runs 18 songs long, or 20 when including the bonus tracks, and has five contributions from The Weeknd. "Shot for Me," "Crew Love" "Cameras / Good Ones Go Interlude," "Practice," and "The Ride" all feature a writing credit from The Weeknd.

So given that Weeknd, in two days, contributed to a quarter of Take Care.... and 40 was in there for a year... who really looks like the higher-powered contributor

I'm not trying to hate on 40 but still, give Abel the credit he's due... yes they could have made Take Care without him but even besides his actual writing, I think it's clear that his own wave influenced that record. I honestly doubt Drake would have put the pressure on himself to make Take Care as good as it was, without House of Balloons

He's not wrong

I mean, directly contributed to 5, sure. Indirectly through The Weeknd’s style of music/aesthetic at the time? You’d imagine a little more.

Part of the reason why the ‘misconception’ exists is down to how much of Take Care does sound like an OVOXO collaborative project.

You can see why 40 as a producer would be aggrieved, and he’s more than entitled to say he physically produced the other 17 tracks or so, but I think he’s being a little obtuse if he lessens The Weeknd’s contributions to Take Care down to just those 5 songs he directly has credits for.

The other difficult part for ppl to wrap their heads around is how much Abel’s music was directly influenced by Drake

U can listen to a lot of pre-Weeknd Drake records and say “Dam this sounds like Abel”

I’ve always seen it as a full circle type of thing

lol he's literally right

Abel contributed in some way to 5 songs on the album.... and was credited for 5 songs on the album. Take away those songs and Take Care is still a classic.

Yeah I don't see an issue, hes just mad that a lot of people on the internet are always over-exaggerating exactly how much abel contributed on the record. He even acknowledges that those records are very strong records too. Theres just much more to the album than OVOXO.

Yeah I agree Weeknd wasn't like essential to Take Care entirely... although his songs really are among the strongest on the record. But I think 40 still kind of understated it. Sure there is a little bit too much "Weeknd made Take Care" type rhetoric but Weeknd really does deserve his due... as Drake does for the Weeknd, as well.

Drake did nothing for Abel in terms of music.
Only thing The Weeknd owes to Drake is exposure and i would even argue about that. Abel blew up by himself

Take is still a classic without crew love, the ride, practice? Lol come on stop it.

SFG directly influenced The Weeknd’s sound tho

bro what

Abel said it himself fam

It’s really not hard to see that both of them fed off of each other in some way shape or form.

While Thrice & nigerius are correct, citing it straight from the horse's mouth, on the matter of "who influenced The Weeknd's distinctive sound", aside from Drake, I'd like to add what I consider a bigger element that is often overlooked, the elephant in the room: Jeremy "Zodiac" Rose

crine @op let’s see how long it would take abel to produce Take Care

you’re acting like they had the same responsibilities, weeknd literally just wrote on those four tracks

I dont understand how people dont understand.
Its clear as day

oh look whos back

Contributed to 5 songs but let's not pretend like Weeknd's sound didn't have a strong influence on the album

All I want are those Abel reference tracks. Also 40 comes off as mad b****made even bringing this s*** up 10 years on

OG 2010 versions of Crew Love & Practice have both leaked already

nigga made 3 songs and think he create a sub-genre. f*** jeremy rose.

Just because Abel & Jeremy didn't collaborate long enough for Jeremy to be seen by the fans as a longtime collaborator as Doc or Illangelo in years, or in the number of tracks/projects created together, it doesn't mean his input wasn't valuable.

If what Jeremy says in that interview is true*, then he created the idea of that Weeknd sound we fell in love with, the sound that elevated his name among the most talked about musicians of current music industry. I'm not saying Abel has no merit, kudos to him for dropping 3 iconic mixtapes in that sound, but the idea (allegedly Jeremy's) idea was the spark. And as everybody knows, an idea is priceless.

(*all Abel has said about the matter was a weak "Don't f*** with him. Especially that disgusting interview he did about me.", an even weaker response than Drake's (or the people close to him) claim after the Pusha T diss, that "Drake has made a response diss track, but he won't publish it cause if he would, he would utterly destroy Push)

Give me the idea of a product that will be the next Mickey Mouse/Disney killer, and years from now I will say "SatanicScum only doodled/scribbled three drawings on paper and thinks he made this multinational entertainment company, f*** him"

the problem is that A LOT of people be claiming s*** like Abel wrote/did the whole album and it's a shame, because people do it because they can't simply say "I like a Drake album"

people be saying stuff like Abel wrote The Ride bars and s***

You gotta let these clowns go bro.
I cant phantom ppl that cant enjoy music from different artists thats stupid as hell.
And all the stan wars lol f*** outta here if i love the music i love it.

Also Thrice is funny as hell he only comments when its time to hate on The Weeknd.
Bro never comments on the music lmfao