Drake’s Take Care turns 15 on Sunday, November 15. The 2011 album leaked online nine days before release, then opened at number one in the US anyway with 631,000 copies sold in its first week, and last year it was certified Diamond for 10 million units.
It also earned Drake his first Grammy, Best Rap Album at the 2013 ceremony, and it has never really left the charts: it was still the 38th-biggest album in the US across all of 2025.
Named for taking his time
The title was a reaction to his debut. Drake felt Thank Me Later (2010) had been rushed, and he told an interviewer: “That’s why my new album is called Take Care because I get to take my time this go-round.”
He leaned on his longtime producer Noah “40” Shebib this time, aiming for a more unified sound, and recorded mostly in Toronto. 40 is credited as producer on eight of the 17 standard-edition songs but also engineered and mixed much of the album. Boi-1da, T-Minus, Jamie xx, Just Blaze and the Weeknd also produced tracks.
The release itself slipped. Drake first wanted it out on his 25th birthday, October 24, 2011, then pushed it to November 15 because three samples still needed clearing, on “Take Care,” “Cameras” and “Practice.”
The guest list, then and now
The cast is wide. Rihanna sings on the title track, which is built on Gil Scott-Heron’s version of “I’ll Take Care of You.” The Weeknd is on “Crew Love,” Kendrick Lamar gets the “Buried Alive Interlude,” Nicki Minaj is on “Make Me Proud,” Rick Ross is on “Lord Knows,” and Stevie Wonder plays harmonica on “Doing It Wrong.”
The most talked-about pairing may be “The Real Her,” where André 3000 and Lil Wayne both deliver verses. André’s Atlanta roots came up again this fall when Outkast teamed with Nike on a Georgia Bulldogs collection.
From leak to Diamond: the numbers
- 631,000: first-week US sales in November 2011, Drake’s second number one album.
- January 31, 2012: Platinum, about 11 weeks after release.
- 2,260,000: US copies sold by August 2015.
- October 25, 2023: eight times Platinum.
- October 24, 2025: Diamond, on Drake’s 39th birthday, the same date he had first wanted the album out.
That last detail is a neat bit of symmetry: the Diamond plaque landed exactly 14 years to the day after the release date Drake originally picked. Four of the singles reached the top 20 of the US singles chart, yet none hit number one, which makes the album one of the strongest 21st-century performers without a chart-topping single.
Why it still lands
The record set the template that much of Drake’s later work, and a good deal of Toronto rap and R&B, would follow: slow tempos, muffled drums, empty space and lyrics that swing between bragging and self-doubt. It ran 80 minutes and 18 seconds in its standard form.
Drake’s commercial run has only grown since. Last month he turned 40 as new RIAA plaques made him the first artist past 350 million certified units, and his trademark fringe shawl even became a Halloween costume when Gabourey Sidibe dressed as the rapper.
Take Care hits 15 years on November 15, a Diamond album that began with a leak and a delay.
Further reading
Illustrative image. Image: Wladyslaw, CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
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