Over the last decade, the rapper-producer tag team of Aubrey Drake Graham and Noah “40” Shebib has crafted classics songs and moments. The two creators discovered their musical styles match well together, and many fans have been along for the ride ever since.
As a result, 40 has basically chosen to concentrate his efforts on making beats only for Drake. Even though he has produced for artists like Lil Wayne and Alicia Keys, Shebib was asked about declining to work with non-Drizzy musicians during the second episode of The ETCs with Kevin Durant podcast.
New ep out with @OVO40 #TheETCs https://t.co/Npw2b4S1OF https://t.co/ycfwAl3pGv
— Kevin Durant (@KDTrey5) October 15, 2020
“I probably solidified the decision when I won the ASCAP Songwriter Award three years in a row. And I think it was ’11, ’12, ’13. And so, in ’13 when I won it a third year in a row, I’m sitting there like, ‘Yo, I only have ever worked with one artist. This is crazy. I’m Songwriter Of The year again? This is like, insane,'” 40 told Durant and The ETCs co-host Eddie Gonzalez.
The Canadian added, “That moment, I was like, ‘I’m never working with anybody ever again.’ Because it’s just too much work. It’s too much effort. I don’t need to do that. And it’s a very emotionally exhausting experience to go into the studio with somebody and create from scratch and do all of that. I found one of my best friends, and we make incredible music together. Like, I’m gonna go sit with someone else and have to relearn that energy and figure out what we’re gonna do… And also, I make slow-ass, dark-ass R&B, f##### up, weird music that only Drake knows what to do with. I give that s### to other people, and they’ll look at me like I’m crazy.”
https://twitter.com/OVO40/status/624021399984820224?s=20
40 also admitted he is not interested in branching out to work with other artists because he feels he needs Drake’s help, guidance, assistance, and reassurance. The 2-time Grammy winner then explained that he does not want someone else to have the sound they created because it is more valuable to the OVO pair that way.
“And truthfully, I don’t think every other artist in the world is good enough to take my weird-ass s### and turn it into something as incredible as Drake,” stated 40. “Most people you’d give them ‘Marvins Room,’ [they’d] be like, ‘What the f### is this? S### don’t sound like anything.’ I’d be like, ‘Yeah, it doesn’t sound like anything. Can you make a song out of it? I don’t know. Drake did.’ And when he does that s###, I’m just like, ‘Yeah, f### everybody. He’s the GOAT. I don’t need to deal with no one else.'”
