Nav Explains Why Drake Isn't On His New Album

BYAron A.10.9K Views
Link Copied to Clipboard!
Jerod Harris/Getty Images, Rich Fury/Getty Images
Rapper Nav attends The Hyde Away, hosted by Republic Records & SBE, presented by Hudson and bareMinerals during Coachella on April 14, 2017 in Thermal, California. Drake, winner of the Artist of the Decade Award, poses backstage for the 2021 Billboard Music Awards, broadcast on May 23, 2021 at Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, California. 
Nav reveals why his unreleased song with Drake didn't appear on "Demons Protected By Angels."

Though Nav might not be a household name, he certainly has access to many artists that are. His new album, Demons Protected By Angels is 19 songs in total with features from the biggest names in rap like Future, Travis Scott, Lil Baby, and more. However, there appears to be one name that could've been on the tracklist and that's Drake. During a recent conversation on Full Send Podcast, Nav explained why he omitted his unreleased song with The Boy from his latest opus.

Nav attends the 2021 American Music Awards at Microsoft Theater on November 21, 2021 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images)

"Drake's an amazing person. We hang out all the time in Toronto. We did a song," he explained before admitting it wasn't up to his standards. "I feel like, you know, we could've done a better song and the timeframe was just, you know, not good. It didn't work out."

However, the main reason why he didn't include Drake on the album is because he knew that it would overshadow the rest of the songs on the album. "He's such a big artist that I didn't want to put the song on the album and have it take away from anything else on the album. You know, like, take away life from all the other moments."


The notion that Nav omitted a Drake collab from his new album left the podcast hosts in awe but many people seemed to understand where Nav was coming from.

Perhaps, the decision to not include Drake on the project also relates to the revelation DJ Khaled made last week. The God Did artist explained that no one in the industry really ever critiques Drake when they're working with him.

The last time Drake and Nav collaborated was when the Demons Protected By Angels artist quietly produced Drizzy's scathing Grammy-nominated diss track, "Back To Back" in 2016. Clearly, there's a standard to live up to. 

Check out Nav's full interview on the Full Send Podcast below. 


About The Author
Aron A. is a features editor for HotNewHipHop. Beginning his tenure at HotNewHipHop in July 2017, he has comprehensively documented the biggest stories in the culture over the past few years. Throughout his time, Aron’s helped introduce a number of buzzing up-and-coming artists to our audience, identifying regional trends and highlighting hip-hop from across the globe. As a Canadian-based music journalist, he has also made a concerted effort to put spotlights on artists hailing from North of the border as part of Rise & Grind, the weekly interview series that he created and launched in 2021. Aron also broke a number of stories through his extensive interviews with beloved figures in the culture. These include industry vets (Quality Control co-founder Kevin "Coach K" Lee, Wayno Clark), definitive producers (DJ Paul, Hit-Boy, Zaytoven), cultural disruptors (Soulja Boy), lyrical heavyweights (Pusha T, Styles P, Danny Brown), cultural pioneers (Dapper Dan, Big Daddy Kane), and the next generation of stars (Lil Durk, Latto, Fivio Foreign, Denzel Curry). Aron also penned cover stories with the likes of Rick Ross, Central Cee, Moneybagg Yo, Vince Staples, and Bobby Shmurda.
...