For weeks, Twitter has run rampant with speculation about a new mixtape from Toronto’s biggest booster, Aubrey Drake Graham. Last night, Drake’s latest dropped amid a rash of “fire” emoji, and how and when it was released raised some eyebrows. First, there was some early confusion about whether this indeed even was a mixtape—because at $12.99 on iTunes, If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late was priced more like an album. Later, the entire record was available to stream for free on Soundcloud, on a link that was quickly removed, which only made things more confusing.
Speculation ran rampant that the new tape served as Drake’s way of expediting the end of his four-record contract with Cash Money. Recently, Drake’s mentor Lil Wayne has found himself in an intense feud with label head Birdman ostensibly about the release of his own album Tha Carter V, which has been pushed back on numerous occasions. Wayne later released his own tape to his fans, Sorry For the Wait 2, as a form or recompense. He later hit Cash Money with a $51 million lawsuit. As Wayne’s protege, it’s not hard to picture who’s side Drake falls on in the dispute.
By dropping If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late with a very album-like price tag, some might say Drake is attempting to satisfy his own contract requirements from the label and make a clean getaway. This is lent some credence by the fact that the title of the tape reads somewhat antagonistically, and that it fails to feature any number of tracks that stand out as radio singles—all combined with Drake’ supposed plan to drop his official Nothing Was The Same follow-up, tentatively titled Views From The 6, later this year.
Whether Drake is going after Cash Money or not, Drake does have some more obvious vitriol for someone—namely, Tyga and his girlfriend Kylie Jenner, whom he references on the track “6pm In New York.” Drake calls out his Young Money label mate for some choice comments he made in a recent interview, saying, “I heard a lil homie talking reckless in Vibe / Quite a platform you chose, you shoulda kept it inside / Oh you tried, it’s so childish calling my name on the world stage / You need to act your age and not your girl’s age.”
You can hear “6pm” and the rest of If You’re Reading This over at iTunes.