"Miss Me" is the third single
by Canadian recording artist
Drake
Drake may refer to:
Animals
* A male duck
People and fictional characters
* Drake (surname), a list of people and fictional characters with the family name
* Drake (given name), a list of people and fictional characters with the given name
* ...
from his debut album ''
Thank Me Later
''Thank Me Later'' is the debut studio album by Canadian rapper and singer Drake. It was released on June 15, 2010, by Young Money Entertainment, Cash Money Records, and Universal Motown Records. Production for the album took place at various re ...
''. The hip hop song features labelmate and
Young Money
Young Money Entertainment is an American record label founded by rapper Lil Wayne. Young Money's president is Lil Wayne's lifelong friend and fellow rapper Mack Maine. The label was an imprint of Cash Money Records and is distributed by Republi ...
founder
Lil Wayne
Dwayne Michael Carter Jr. (born September 27, 1982), known professionally as Lil Wayne, is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, and record executive. His career began in 1995, at the age of 12, when he was signed by rapper Birdman (rapper), ...
. It was produced by Drake's long-time collaborators
Boi-1da
Matthew Jehu Samuels (born October 12, 1986), known professionally as Boi-1da ( , a play on "boy wonder"), is a Jamaican-Canadian Record production, record producer and songwriter based in Toronto, Ontario.
The Toronto raised producer has work ...
and
40. It peaked at number fifteen on US
''Billboard'' Hot 100, becoming the third consecutive track to attain chart success from the album. It was certified
platinum
Platinum is a chemical element with the symbol Pt and atomic number 78. It is a dense, malleable, ductile, highly unreactive, precious, silverish-white transition metal. Its name originates from Spanish , a diminutive of "silver".
Platinu ...
by the
Recording Industry Association of America
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
(RIAA).
Background
The song was originally by rapper
Bun B
Bernard James Freeman (born March 19, 1973), known professionally as Bun B, is an American rapper. He is best known as one half of the southern rap duo UGK (UnderGround Kingz), a group he formed in 1987 alongside Pimp C. Aside from his work with ...
featuring Drake for his 3rd album, ''
Trill OG
''Trill OG'' is the third solo studio album by UGK member Bun B. It is the third album in his ''Trill'' series. The album was released under Universal Music Group after Bun B left Warner Music Group's Asylum Records. The album was released Augus ...
'', with a different chorus, entitled "All Night Long." This version was never released, but a version with Drake's and Bun B's verses and the final chorus was released as the "OG Mix", which is the official remix of the song, on September 13, 2010, on Bun B's
Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
page. The song samples "Wildflower" by
Hank Crawford
Bennie Ross "Hank" Crawford, Jr. (December 21, 1934 – January 29, 2009) was an American Alto saxophone, alto saxophonist, arranger and songwriter whose genres ranged from Rhythm and blues, R&B, hard bop, jazz-funk, and soul jazz. Crawford was ...
.
Drake told
MTV News
MTV News is the news production division of MTV. The service is available in the US with localized versions on MTV's global network. In February 2016, MTV Networks confirmed it would refresh the MTV News brand in 2016, to compete with the likes ...
: "It's a song about being away from what you love and hoping that when you're gone, doing you, somebody out there misses you."
Music video
The music video was directed by
Anthony Mandler
Anthony Mandler (born April 18, 1973) is an American film director, music video director, television commercial director and photographer. As a music video director, his most notable and frequent collaborator is Rihanna. The two have worked on s ...
. Drake shot his scenes on July 15, 2010. Shots of Lil Wayne were filmed in early 2010 by director David Rousseau before Wayne went to jail. The video premiered at 8 PM Eastern Standard Time on August 19, 2010, on MTV.
Mandler told
MTV
MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...
that the video was a particular challenge because Lil Wayne's footage was shot prior to Mandler coming on board as director: "It wasn't shot the way I would have shot it, so I had to come up with a world where I had ultimate control. I think with Drake, we're always looking for overarching themes. We're always looking for bigger themes to hang our hat on. With 'Miss Me,' what was interesting to me was not the idea of 'miss me because Wayne was going to jail.' Because it was deeper than that. It was the attainability versus the unattainability. And how stars and people who are public figures are expected to sit on a platform and be grabbed and watched and photographed and controlled. The idea for me was, what happens if it's not that clear, everything is a click off, all these unrelated scenarios are related by a textual theme and trying to play that into that, rather than some straight narrative, because we didn't have control... 'cause we didn't have Wayne".
The director said he incorporated a set where everything was slightly off. The set was built with a converging ceiling, in order to appear smaller. The lead actress in the video was never fully shown. The Young Money star appears but then quickly disappears. The video closes with a memory of a lost friend.
Chart performance
As a promotional single, "Miss Me" shot onto the
''Billboard'' Hot 100 at number 15 for its debut, making it his highest-charting U.S debut off ''
Thank Me Later
''Thank Me Later'' is the debut studio album by Canadian rapper and singer Drake. It was released on June 15, 2010, by Young Money Entertainment, Cash Money Records, and Universal Motown Records. Production for the album took place at various re ...
''. It then fell to number 76 in the next several weeks, but once it was released as an official single it rebounded to number 39. The single was certified
platinum
Platinum is a chemical element with the symbol Pt and atomic number 78. It is a dense, malleable, ductile, highly unreactive, precious, silverish-white transition metal. Its name originates from Spanish , a diminutive of "silver".
Platinu ...
by the
Recording Industry Association of America
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
(RIAA) for sales of a million digital copies in the United States.
Charts
Weekly charts
Year-end charts
Certifications and sales
References
{{authority control
2010 singles
Drake (musician) songs
Lil Wayne songs
Music videos directed by Anthony Mandler
Song recordings produced by Boi-1da
Song recordings produced by 40 (record producer)
Songs written by Lil Wayne
Songs written by Drake (musician)
Cash Money Records singles
Songs written by Boi-1da
2009 songs