Label insiders believe the Drake-Future mixtape, What a Time to Be Alive, could sell as much as 500k in its opening week.
The mixtape hit iTunes Sunday night. Just before it landed it streamed on Beats 1 OVO Sound Radio.
Such a huge opening is not Drake’s first time at the rodeo. His Feb. “mixtape,” If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late, moved about 541k in its first week with singles and streams, later becoming the first 2015 release to hit the 1 million mark. His previous release, the “official” 2013 album Nothing Was the Same, sold 658k in its first week and has gone on to sell 2.4m.
The arrival of What a Time in the marketplace radically changes the picture for Friday’s chart, where the latest from Interscope’s Lana Del Rey previously looked like a strong contender for #1. Now, Drake-Future is expected to have a huge first week—even with just four days on this week’s chart it looks bound to blow away not just this week’s competition but most of the year’s first-week figures.
Drake’s “Hotline Bling” single, meanwhile, which is not a part of the mixtape, is #1 on the singles side at iTunes.
Looks like that $19 million reportedly paid Drake is paying off.
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