Ten years ago, Drake surprise-dropped If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late, his fourth and possibly most influential album. IYRTITL marked the fourth time the Toronto-born icon earned the No. 1 spot on the Billboard 200 chart and broke his own record for first-week Spotify streams. The album forever changed the industry, making surprise drops a common practice and putting the YMCMB label feud in the spotlight. Ask any Drake fan their favorite question: rank every Drake project, and you’d be hard-pressed to find someone that doesn’t have IYRTITL in their top 3.
The album was released Feb. 12, 2015, while Drake was embattled in a rumored feud with his label, Cash Money Records. These rumors intensified after Lil Wayne tweeted about his own frustrations with the label, demanding his exit alongside Drake and Nicki Minaj. Wayne blamed Cash Money for the delay of his long-awaited album, Tha Carter V, according to Complex.
Drake remained relatively quiet about the dispute, despite speculation that he was owed long-overdue royalties from Cash Money and Birdman. However, the release of IYRTITL only fueled those rumors. On “Star67,” Drake had fans convinced that he was hinting at his label, rapping: “Brand new Beretta, can’t wait to let it go / Walk up in my label like ‘Where the check, though?’” Many fans speculated that the album title itself was a shot at Birdman and Cash Money. At the time, Genius mentioned in their album annotations that the album cover, designed by NYC street artist Jim Joe, was supposed to represent a ransom letter and that If Your Reading This It’s Too Late is his way of saying that Birdman fumbled his artist, and it’s too late to reconcile.
In many ways, this project marked the beginning of the end for Drake and Cash Money. While his next three projects were still released under the Young Money/Cash Money masthead, his subsequent and most commercially successful album, Scorpion, made his intentions clear. On “Is There More,” he rapped: “Soon as this album drop, I’m out of the deal.”
If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late is the distant cousin of a mixtape. When it was released, there was widespread debate about the classification of the project due to its surprise release and semi-unfinished production. In the weeks after its release, DatPiff founder Kyle Reilly revealed in an interview with HipHopDX that IYRTITL was originally supposed to be a mixtape released for free through DJ Drama’s Gangsta Grillz series. The sonic content of the album further fueled the mixtape vs. album debate. IYRTITL featured a raw style that we had yet to see out of Drake. Thank Me Later introduced the world to Drake with a more mainstream hip-hop sound focused on catchy hooks and melodies. Take Care introduced us to R&B Drake, and his core group of collaborators, featuring The Weeknd and Rihanna, carried him to new mainstream success. Nothing Was the Same was the first time we heard a new sense of fame and responsibility from Drake. There is a noticeable shift from the hungry energy of his previous work to this new braggadocious, luxury rap.
At its core, this album is Drake on his own, at his most vulnerable. Compared to Nothing Was the Same, IYRTITL feels raw, stripped-down, and brooding. Executive produced by Noah “40” Shebib and Boi-1da, this album feel more skeletal, bringing this eerie, almost moody style that I think is supposed to represent both this newfund hunger in Drake and his environment in Toronto. “Energy,” “10 Bands,” and “No Tellin’” are all representative of this new style of raw, hypnotic, repetitive beats that complement Drake’s delivery.
This project also leaned away from his usual pop sensibilities. Drake had always blended singing and rapping in each of his projects, but IYRTITL abandoned these radio-friendly hooks and emotional tracks in favor of pure rapping. His delivery becomes much sharper and confrontational. The influence of Atlanta trap, which was becoming mainstream in 2015, can be heard throughout this project. One can only guess that Drake’s closest collaborators at this point, Future and Young Thug, had an immeasurable impact on the style of this project. The Atlanta style of quick delivery and favoring freestyling over writing was obviously influential on this album, as we see the most rap-heavy Drake album to date, even 10 years on. In true Atlanta style, Metro Boomin and 808 Mafia, who produced “6 God” and “Company,” are also prominent contributors to the production of the album.
One of the more interesting parts of this project is the notable absence of major features. His previous two projects, Nothing Was the Same and Take Care, both leaned heavily into features for their hits, with major artists mainly supplying choruses for songs that sound like Drake features. IYRTITL is different. He brings in PARTYNEXTDOOR, his newly signed artist, for two songs, Lil Wayne, his labelmate, for one song, and Travis Scott, an up-and-coming artist at the time, for one as well. In contrast to his other projects, none of these features, besides “Preach” (feat. PARTYNEXTDOOR), are the focal point of the track. Travis brings in his background vocals, and Wayne drops in for 16 bars, but nothing that makes them anything more than the supporting point of the song. IYRTITL is Drake’s bid to become the face of rap, and he recognizes that his path can’t be supported by Rihanna and Rick Ross features.
In the aftermath of IYRTITL, it became one of Drake’s most beloved projects, receiving rave reviews from platforms like Pitchfork and Rolling Stone. Pitchfork’s Craig Jenkins described it as “Drake’s Rocky run,” also addressing its confrontational nature, stating, “Inspired by gauntlet tosses from adversaries high and low, Drake uses the mixtape to toast and taunt a rogue’s gallery of industry frenemies.”
As we keep $ome $exy $ongs 4 U on repeat, reflect on one of Drake’s best and rawest rap-focused albums, If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late.
Listen to ‘If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late’ below!