When Fabolous wanted to put out a remix of "Throw It in the Bag," he flipped the beat and invited another MC to join in. For Drake, though, who got the call from Loso to collaborate on the remix, things weren't quiet so simple.

"Fab is talking about something very specific," Drake said of the shopping-spree-based tune. "He's talking about going to a store and buying [girls] things. I've never done that before. I've bought something for a female, but I can't walk into a store with her and buy her something that she asks for or buy her something in front of her face. I feel like that's impersonal. I feel like I'm being used at that point."

The Young Money artist put his rhymes together, but he warned Fabolous that his verse might be a different take on things. "It's not exactly going with [the] concept, but it's a real situation," Drake said.

That formula, using real life to inspire his art, is what has helped the Toronto lyricist evolve from his first mixtape, Room for Improvement, through his breakout collection, So Far Gone.

"I was listening the other day to a really old song I did — well, old to me. It was about three or four years old," Drake said. "And I noticed, for the first time in my career, I noticed some consistency. Although my content was more braggadocious, because I really didn't have anything back then, so I wanted to speak like I had everything. That's just being young and being influenced by other people. But I noticed I was still talking about myself. If I complimented myself, I would follow it up. I'd catch myself.

"Now it's at that point where I can only rap about what's going on around me," he said.