It’s official: surprise albums are the new music industry standard. The latest artist to prove this is Drake, who broke the Internet on Thursday night (Feb. 12) with the release of If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late. Shaping up to be quite a success, the 17-track project is slated to debut at No. 1 on the Billboard charts.
Projections are steadily increasing for the amount of units Drizzy will move, as the latest figure puts the Young Money rapper at 500,000 copies by the end of of the track week (Feb. 15), according to Billboard, making it the second biggest music debut in the past year – in just three days. The No. 1 slot will also serve as Drake’s fourth time time debuting atop the chart. If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late’s debut will come second to Taylor Swift’s 1989 debut, which raked in over 1.2 million copies in its first week, which was a full seven-day period.
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Speculation has run rampant that Drizzy’s surprise album was meant to fulfill his final album requirement under Cash Money Records, as tensions mount between Birdman and Lil Wayne. While that has not been confirmed, the release is shaping up to be a reason for Drake, Birdman and Lil Wayne to celebrate.
Not too shabby, Aubrey. Not too shabby at all.