''Life of a Don'' (also abbreviated to ''L.O.A.D.'') is the second studio album by American singer and rapper

Don Toliver Caleb Zackery "Don" Toliver ( ; born June 12, 1994) is an American rapper and singer. He emerged to fame in 2018 with the release of his debut mixtape, ''Donny Womack'', and his feature on the song "Can't Say" by fellow Houston rapper Travis Sco ...

. It was released on October 8, 2021, through

Cactus Jack Records Cactus Jack Records is a record label founded by American rapper Travis Scott in 2017. As of 2025, current acts include Scott himself, Sheck Wes, Don Toliver, Luxury Tax 50, Chase B, SoFaygo and Wallie the Sensei, while former acts include Smokep ...

Atlantic Records Atlantic Recording Corporation (simply known as Atlantic Records) is an American record label founded in October 1947 by Ahmet Ertegun and Herb Abramson. Over the course of its first two decades, starting from the release of its first recor ...

, and We Run It. The production on the album was handled by multiple producers, including Mike Dean,

Mustard Mustard may refer to: Food and plants * Mustard (condiment), a paste or sauce made from mustard seeds used as a condiment * Mustard plant, one of several plants, having seeds that are used for the condiment ** Mustard seed, small, round seeds of ...

Metro Boomin Leland Tyler Wayne (born September 16, 1993), known professionally as Metro Boomin, is an American record producer and music executive. Widely acclaimed for his dark and cinematic production style, he is regarded as one of the most influential p ...

Allen Ritter Allen Raphael Ritter (born June 19, 1988) is an American record producer and songwriter. A frequent collaborator of fellow producers Boi-1da, Vinylz, and Sevn Thomas, Ritter has worked in production for high-profile hip hop and contemporary R&B, ...

Hit-Boy Chauncey Alexander Hollis Jr. (born May 21, 1987), known professionally as Hit-Boy, is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He first signed with fellow producer Polow da Don in 2007 as in-house production staff for his l ...

Cardo A ''cardo'' (: ''cardines'') was a north–south street in Ancient Rome, ancient Roman cities and military castra, camps as an integral component of Urban planning, city planning. The ''cardo maximus'', or most often the ''cardo'', was the main ...

, and

Sonny Digital Sonny Corey Uwaezuoke (born March 5, 1991), better known by his stage name Sonny Digital, is an American record producer, rapper, and DJ.

, among others. The album also features guest appearances from

Travis Scott Jacques Bermon Webster III (born April 30, 1991), known professionally as Travis Scott (formerly stylized as Travi$ Scott), is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, and record producer. Scott has had five number-one hits on the U.S. ''Bil ...

Kali Uchis Karly Marina Loaiza (born July 17, 1994), known professionally as Kali Uchis ( ), is an American singer and songwriter. Her accolades include a Grammy Awards, Grammy Award, an American Music Awards, American Music Award, two Billboard Music Awar ...

Baby Keem Hykeem Jamaal Carter Jr. (born October 22, 2000), known professionally as Baby Keem, is an American rapper and record producer. Raised in Las Vegas, he gained recognition in the late 2010s with his contributions to '' Black Panther: The Album'' ...

, HVN, and

SoFaygo Andre Dontrel Burt Jr. (born October 3, 2001), better known by his stage name SoFaygo (formerly stylized as $ofaygo), is an American rapper and singer. His 2019 single, " Knock Knock", went viral on TikTok in late 2020 before it received platinum ...

. ''Life of a Don'' was supported by two singles: " What You Need" and "Drugs n Hella Melodies". The album received generally positive reviews from music critics and was a commercial success. It debuted at number two on the US ''Billboard'' 200 chart, earning 68,000

album-equivalent unit The album-equivalent unit, or album equivalent, often shortened to just unit, is a sales metric in the music industry that defines the number of streaming media, songs streamed and music download, songs downloaded equal to one Record sales, tradi ...

s in its first week.

Release and promotion

On February 2, 2021, Don Toliver cryptically announced ''Life of a Don'' via

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

. Toliver's

label boss, American rapper and singer

, teased his excitement and involvement in the album in a tweet on April 9. Toliver had previously planned to release the album in July 2021. On September 28, Toliver announced the release date of the album and revealed its cover art a few hours later. He also teased the opening track, "Xscape", in a trailer video of the album. To support the album, Toliver went on tour with American rapper Bia, serving as a special guest.

Singles

Two singles preceded the release of the album. The lead single, " What You Need", was released on May 4, 2021. The second single, "Drugs n Hella Melodies", featuring Toliver's girlfriend, Colombian-American singer

, was released on June 18, 2021. Both music videos were filmed in Colombia and released alongside the songs on their respective release dates.

Critical reception

''Life of a Don'' was met with generally positive reviews. At

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, which assigns a

normalized Normalization or normalisation refers to a process that makes something more normal or regular. Science * Normalization process theory, a sociological theory of the implementation of new technologies or innovations * Normalization model, used in ...

rating out of 100 to reviews from professional publications, the album received an

average In colloquial, ordinary language, an average is a single number or value that best represents a set of data. The type of average taken as most typically representative of a list of numbers is the arithmetic mean the sum of the numbers divided by ...

score of 73, based on six reviews.

Commercial performance

''Life of a Don'' debuted at number two on the US ''Billboard'' 200 chart, earning 68,000

s, (including 18,000 copies in pure album sales) in its first week. This became Toliver's second US top-ten debut on the chart and highest-charting album to date. The album also accumulated a total of 64.13 million on-demand streams from the album's songs.

Track listing

Notes * "Xscape", "Outerspace", and "Bogus" are stylized in

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Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

References

{{Don Toliver 2021 albums Don Toliver albums Atlantic Records albums Albums produced by Cardo (record producer) Albums produced by Hit-Boy Albums produced by DJ Dahi