Drake's surprise song originally planned as free release

Rapper Drake's song 'If You're Reading This It's Too Late' was initially planned to be released free before his record label Cash Money rejected the idea.
Kyle 'KP' Reilly, founder of DatPiff, an online mixtape distribution platform, said in a new interview that the project arriving last week without prior notice was meant to be a Gangsta Grillz mixtape hosted by DJ Drama, reported Aceshowbiz.
He said Cash Money pushed for the mixtape to be released through retail and they would count it as an album.
"Originally we were in talks to release it for free. However the label was not in favour of that and they struck an agreement to release the project the retail route and it would count towards one of his albums."

"It was a mutual decision since he wanted to give it away. The label said, 'Hell no,' not in those words, so they 'agreed' to do it this way as a middle ground and it would count towards his Cash Money deal album total," Reilly said.
The song directly landed at number one on Billboard 200 earlier this week with 535,000 equivalent units that included 495,000 pure album sales.
Drake is still expected to release his new album 'Views From the 6' in the coming months.