Drake is in decidedly rare air after the release of not one, not two, but three new albums on Friday (May 15).
With the stakes higher than ever, and with the eyes of fans (and detractors) around the world firmly affixed to his every move, the 6 god opted for an ambitious release strategy that’s been assessed as everything from a multi-pronged flex aimed at underscoring both his commercial viability and his ability to hop genres with confidence, to a filibuster designed to inundate the zeitgeist with so much at once that any potential criticism fails to stick.
Two things can be true at once, of course, and there’s no denying the ambition at the heart of the simultaneous launch of Iceman, Maid of Honour, and Habibti.
To be clear, a number of artists have challenged themselves, and their audiences, in the past by dropping two different albums (i.e. not a double album, but two separate releases) on the same day. Bruce Springsteen, Nelly, Bright Eyes, Guns N’ Roses, and Insane Clown Posse—just to name a few—have all employed this approach.
Letting loose two complete bodies of work at once is impressive, even if fans do often end up favoring one over the other. But three? That’s a different beast altogether.
As we await official word on whether Drake will ultimately secure all three of the top positions on the Billboard 200 albums chart, which is all but guaranteed, we’re taking a look back at a trio of artists (four if you count our honorable mention) who embarked on similarly ambitious paths in the past, to varying degrees of impact.
Gucci Mane
The Cold War: Part 1 (Guccimerica), The Cold War: Part 2 (Great Brrritain), and The Cold War: Part 3 (Brrrussia) all arrived on Oct. 17, 2009 via Guwop’s own So Icy Ent.
The three mixtapes were released during a particularly prolific period for the massively influential artist, whose The State vs. Radric Davis album, featuring the classic track “Lemonade,” was released later that same year.
Soulja Boy
Amid the hype for Drake’s three new albums, Soulja Boy, in typical Soulja Boy fashion, declared himself “the first rapper to drop three projects in the same day.”
While it’s true that Soulja’s Cortez, Paranormal Activity, and Dat Piff tapes were indeed released on Halloween night in 2009, fans were quick to point out that Gucci’s aforementioned Cold War tapes actually came first.
E-40
E-40 kickstarted his The Block Brochure series with Welcome to the Soil 1, 2, and 3 on March 26, 2012. At the time, he was fresh off wrapping his Revenue Retrievin’ series, which included two-projects-at-once drops in 2010 and 2011.
With The Block Brochure, E-40 repeated this approach but expanded it, giving fans three new albums on the same day in 2012, then three more the following year.
Honorable mention: Green Day
There was a moment in American pop culture during which Green Day, then enjoying a new commercial peak thanks to a second act brought on by American Idiot and its follow-up 21st Century Breakdown, were just as ubiquitous as Drake. It felt like Billie Joe Armstrong, Mike Dirnt, and Tré Cool were, somehow, everywhere all at once, all the time.
Then, starting in September 2012, the Grammy-winning Bay Area punk legends aimed to raise the stakes even higher with the release of ¡Uno!, the first album in a trilogy. By December of that year, all three entries in the trilogy had been released. Amid the band’s busiest period to date, Armstrong sought treatment for substance abuse.
