“Hotline Bling,” a song co-written and performed by Canadian rapper Aubrey Drake Graham, known simply as Drake, rose to popularity in late 2015. While it was well known for its corresponding music video, it has also been critically praised for its emotional depth. Essentially, “Hotline Bling” is an emotional appeal from the narrator, Drake, to a former lover, who remains unnamed in the song. Throughout several stanzas that center around the phrase “ever since I left the city,” Drake uses the rhetorical devices of pathos and ethos in an attempt to compare and contrast his past and current relationship with his lover in an attempt to get her back (Drake). He uses pathos by eliciting memories and emotions in his lyrics, and employs ethos by attempting to discredit his lost lover’s recent behaviors. Together along with a defined structure, memorable lyrics, and tempo changes, Drake reveals his feelings while using rhetorical appeals throughout the song.
Throughout the entire song, Drake refers to his past experiences with his lover and describes how he feels things between them have changed in the time since he has been away from her. His words are very simple, and he addresses his lover directly. The narrative of this song centers on a relationship between people who are living in different locations and life rhythms. He sings about the fact that she has changed since he moved away and is not being loyal to him. In a way, he feels like he has not control over the situation because he doesn’t live in the same city as her anymore. Even when she does reach out to him, he is touched by her call and at the same time he ignores motives of it because he understands that it has no clear objective. With his lyrics, he reaches out to her to tell him how he feels.
The structure of the song is very similar to that of any love ballad, though the music and lyrics are pure R&B. It contains two verses, a bridge, and a chorus which repeats the song’s title: “I know when that hotline bling / That can only mean one thing.” This is a reference to the main theme of the song, a man who feels like his lover’s motivations, behavior, and reputation have changed “ever since I left the city.” These choruses contrast their former relationship with their current situation by reminding her that she used to call late at night to talk to him, “late night when you need my love” (Drake).
However, in the verses he talks about how things are now. His ex-lover has changed in many ways that imply that she hasn’t been loyal to him and he expressed the stress that this is causing him. Towards the end of the song, during the bridge, the tempo shifts, the singer’s voice becomes more raw, and the lyrics become more personal before the song returns to a final chorus. Structurally, the song is set up to draw the audience in with a mellow beat and catchy chorus before revealing Drake’s inner emotions. Rhetorically, the song uses the devices of pathos and ethos to express his pain and call out his former lover’s new behaviors.
The song is very emotional from the perspective of the singer and at the same time recognizes the emotional depth that is missing from his current relationship with his ex. In this situation, pathos is the rhetorical strategy used. In the opening chorus, he sings “You used to call me on my cell phone / late night when you need my love.” Here he is using pathos to appeal to her emotions. He wants his lover to remember that she once needed him the same way he needs her now. Even the beginning of the song emphasizes the emotional connection of the past when the listener can hear Drake repeating: “You used to, you used to.” Later he tells her, “You don’t need no one else / You don’t need nobody else,” hoping that she will be faithful to him again (Drake).
In addition to bringing up happy memories from the past, in a way Drake is using pathos to make his lover feel some guilt for the pain he is going through. He sings, “Girl you got me down, you got me stressed out,” and “you make me feel like I done you wrong,” hoping that he can make her feel an emotional response to what he is going through being away from her. He also tells her that he often spends time wondering about her and if she has been with anyone new: “These days all I do is/ Wonder if you’re bending over backwards for someone else” (Drake). When he says this it is obvious that he is very deeply affected by her emotionally, and at the same time that he is expressing his pain, he also hopes to create an emotional reaction on her part.
The second way that Drake uses rhetoric in this song is when he repeatedly calls on ethos by trying to discredit his ex’s reliability, or trustworthiness, based on how she has been acting lately. He begins with the second line of the first verse: “You got a reputation for yourself now.” He describes how she has been “wearing less,” “going out more,” and enjoying “glasses of champagne out on the dance floor.” She even has a new group of friends influencing her that he doesn’t know at all, and the way he brings this up—“Hangin’ with some girls I’ve never seen before”—along with the fact that he repeats this line at the end of two verses, implies that he does not trust them (Drake).
The singer of “Hotline Bling” also contrasts her current actions with the personality he knew when they were closer. He pleads with her, “You should just be yourself / Right now you’re someone else.” In the past, he says, she “Used to always stay at home, you was a good girl.” Since he has been away, however, she is “never alone,” “always touching road,” in other words travelling so much that she is “Running out of pages in [her] passport” (Drake). In addition to hanging out with a different crowd in different places than he has known her to, she has completely changed her life style and personality. His use of ethos in this lines is meant to discredit her behaviors since they don’t seem like the person he knew before.
At the same time, he is using pathos in these by making an emotional appeal to who she used to be when they were in love. It is a fairly common rhetorical technique used when one partner wants to repair a broken relationship with the other, to romanticize the past and focus on only the good parts. Through these lyrics, Drake expresses that he is deeply upset and at the same time makes an appeal for his lover to be loyal to him again. But he is also lamenting the loss of the relationship he used to have with this woman, as well as the loss of her personality after she seems to have changed so much.
Overall, the song is very emotional and reveals an authentic, personal side of Drake. It is deep but also very accessible because it is spoken from the heart in very plain, uncomplicated language. It is simple in its rhythms and subject matter and at the same time has a particular complexity about it once you look further into the structure and rhetoric of the piece. Since its release, the song as become wildly popular, which illustrates the fact that rhetorical appeals are present all around us in things that we come into contact with every day. Even without recognizing these elements however, the song creates a mood which reflects the songwriter’s message.
Work Cited
Drake. “Hotline Bling.” Aubrey Graham, Paul Jeffries, Timmy Thomas. Republic, 2015. Google Play. Web. 14 April 2016.
