Drakes kinda blue on the December/January issue of Complex. The man really needs an upper of some sort. I think the release of his sophomore album Take Care tomorrow will do the trick. Here’s an excerpt from the full article written by Damien Scott. Here they are speaking on the Headlines video and Drake criticism of his tough guy lyrics…

More than the drop-top stadium, the video’s most talked-about image was Drake draped in all-black Nike apparel, surrounded by two groups of ominous-looking dudes in black hoodies. Blog commenters derided him for renting some thugs to make himself look tough.

But the guys in question are not some newly assembled goon squad. Most come from two of Toronto’s worst neighborhoods, Malvern and Galloway, which have been warring for the past few years. “There’s a lot of people lost in that situation, and through having mutual friends in both of those hoods, we were all able to come together, shoot that video, and immortalize that moment,” says Drake—visibly perturbed that he has to explain himself. “I don’t brag about my hood stories. Everybody’s like, ‘Get the fuck out of here with that shit,’ but I’ve done a lot for the streets out here.”

“Everybody knows Drake isn’t hood,” says Niko, his right-hand man and confidant. Neeks, as the crew calls him, is a quiet, bespectacled dude who met Drizzy back when he was pushing his first mixtape, Room for Improvement. Neeks says Toronto rap used to be much more street-oriented. Kardinal Offishall, Saukrates, and Choclair were the big names. “Drake came and flipped it and said everything that a hood guy can’t say. I guess that’s why people liked him.”

Drake has no delusions of himself as a gangster. He knows he’s at his best when paring down real-life events and emotions other rappers would never tackle. “Any musical sound is real to me,” Drake says as another round of drinks hits the table. “It doesn’t matter if it’s from like Lana Del Ray all the way to Future from Atlanta or ASAP Rocky. Sonically, you can do whatever you want. That’s the beautiful thing about music: you get to make a choice. The more you can start pinpointing pieces of your actual life and start pulling it into your music, people will be like, ‘Damn, that’s something I’ve only thought about, but this guy put it into a song.’ ” He mentions the drunk-dialing ditty “Marvin’s Room” as one example of a song drawn from his daily life.

On newsstands everywhere December 6th.