The kids love Drake, and they’re right to. Drake’s recent EP release, So Far Gone, feels more like a full album, in fact, like a successful sophomore release from an artist who has already had a hot radio hit or two. Put So Far Gone in your playlist and let it run through; it’s varied enough not to bore, cohesive enough not to give you a case of temporary ADHD. The title, So Far Gone, hints at the world-weary lyrics inside the songs as Drake, aka Aubrey Drake Graham, battles with the good and the bad that come with rising fame—fast strippers, fast life, being cut off from his roots, feeling estranged from his family, money, envy, and endless booty calls—and all this from an artist who hasn’t even released his first full album.

Almost anyone under 18 will recognize Drake as Jimmy Brooks, a character on the hit show Degrassi: The Next Generation. Drake is another teenage actor from a Canadian adolescent television show turned music star. (Another? You ask. Don’t remember Alanis Morrisette of ‘90’s Ironic fame, first famous as a cast member on You Can’t Do That On Television? No? Well, this girl from the suburbs remembers her quite fondly.)  Despite Drake’s Canadian, and by all accounts, privileged roots, he pays homage to classic American hip-hop in these seven songs by dissing on other rappers, rapping about the ruin that comes with fans and money and loyalty to where he came from, and hinting at the (somewhat unbelievable) pending sense of doom that might end his rise to the top.

Even though some of the songs’ messages might not match up with what people know about the young rapper, I wouldn’t call Drake a poser, mostly because I like his songs, think his rhymes are complex and have played “Best I’ve Ever Had” about gazillian times according to my iTunes play count. Drake’s rhymes are clever (like this one from Uptown: “Have you counting money, going duffle bag crazy/sipping on Pink Floyd and Puffing Wayne Brady”) and his voice is smooth and mid-ranged, allowing him to make good with different styles of songs—one reason why this EP is so great. And even though Drake hints at the hood and a hard life, he doesn’t necessarily say that he lived through either. It’s more the kind of thing one does to recognize an art form and where it came from, in the same way a British folk singer might croon about Tennessee while never having been there. Drake sings that he wants the money and the cars and the ho’s (he supposes), but that mostly he just wants to be successful. Being signed to Lil Wayne’s Cash Money label and his plans to release a full album next year indicate that he will be. Desire for success is the theme that comes through; he’s a young man with the drive to be on top. That creates a certain energy and a certain element of sorrow that run through each song, and that’s what feels the most real.

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