Only life’s winners are welcome on Cal Cast (iTunes). American college basketball coach John Calipari’s previous guests include Nike creator Phil Knight, his rival coach Rick Pitino and ESPN’s Dan Patrick. If that sounds like the kind of thing you wouldn’t touch with someone else’s headphones, this is the week to give Calipari a try as he’s joined by Drake. These two go back a long way, which makes for a candid chat about his tough childhood, lessons learned on Canadian teen TV show Degrassi: The Next Generation and unfulfilled ambitions.
There’s a strong element of motivational pumping-up as Calipari introduces his latest guest: “Multi-talented superstar, actor, singer, songwriter, entertainer, comedian if he wanted to be: Drake. That’s right, folks, Drake.” You’d expect the rapper to emerge from behind a sparkly curtain high-fiving the audience after that.
The man himself comes across as driven but humble, recalling the time he got high before auditioning for Degrassi, aged 15. It was the incident that shaped his attitude towards work. “I was in tears,” he says. “I thought I’d thrown my whole life away just to be cool.” Although he got a callback and went on to get the part, it was a lesson learned. “I’ll never get intoxicated before I have to do something serious because of that situation,” he says.
Drake is keen to stress he wasn’t gifted with a career after a privileged upbringing. His mum, who he describes as a “superhero in a small package”, suffered from depression as he was growing up. “We fought through a lot together,” he says. “I would lift her up when she was battling depression. The toughest thing we went through together was us being down to nothing and having no means to turn the situation around.”
Calipari steps back and lets his guest get on with dropping revelations. Drake says he’s motivated by the fear that “when I’m not doing it, there’s someone else doing it” and regrets missing out on working with Sade because she chose the then more famous Jay-Z over him. And he dreams of having his own “sexy late night TV” show. “I want to put on Tom Ford every night and laugh with people I’ve spent years with in the business,” he says. Like everyone on this podcast he’s an overachiever, so there’s no reason to suspect he won’t do it.
If you like this, try: The Tim Ferriss Show.
