Death is the only certainty for rap dynasties. One year its"All About the Benjamins"and the next itsLincolns and Washingtons. Cash Money Records has escaped the fate of the Roc-A-Fellas and Bad Boys thanks to the enduring genius of Bryan "Baby" Williams, AKABirdman. Birdmans business acumen and A&R smarts carried Cash Money through three distinct eras, from the late '90s Hot Boys heyday throughLil Waynes mid- to late-2000s bid for "Best Rapper Alive" to the current YMCMB incarnation featuring Drake andNicki Minaj. (WithYoung ThugandRich Homie Quanhe seems to be training still another army.) The wheels appeared to come off of the Cash Money machine for good, however, on a random December afternoon when Wayne gave acurt Twitter updateon his long-gestatingTha Carter Valbum, blaming Birdman and Cash Money for the holdup and demanding an exit from the label hes called home most of his life. Hes since initiatedan audacious $51 million lawsuitrequesting not only his own exit but that of Drake and Nicki Minaj as well.Drake and Nicki have been smartly mum on the split (well,word around townis Birdman was barred from Minajs Grammy party earlier this month), but years of whispers about Drake being owedsubstantial back royaltieswere publicly validated with the surprise release ofIf Youre Reading This Its Too Late, a retail mixtape arriving on the six year anniversary of Drakes star-makingSo Far Gone.If Youre Reading Thisis littered with pith for Drakes label situation ("No Tellin": "Envelopes coming in the mail, let her open em/ Hoping for a check again, aint no telling," "Star67": "Brand new Beretta, cant wait to let it go/ Walk up in my label like Where the check, though?"), and all of this surfacing weeks after Waynes lawsuit bombshell raises a few questions. Is this release aruse to close out Drakes Cash Money deal? Is the absence of Birdman from the mixtapes lengthy thank you's an oversight or an intentional slight? Is the title a dig?If Youre Reading Thisarouses many unanswered questions on a business front, but where it truly delivers is giving Drake room to breathe outside of the lumbering commercialism of his retail albums. Theres little in the way of obvious singles here, (though the Ibiza bop "Preach" might find a chart by accident). Instead we get a spectral late-night longing not unlike that ofSo Far Gonetouchstones "Lust for Life" and "Successful". The pre-fame queasiness of early Drake is now the loneliness of a distrustful despot. On "10 Bands" hes holed up in a home studio for weeks pushing himself to create ("Drapes closed, I dont know what time it is/ Im still awake, I gotta shine this year"). "Know Yourself" celebrates the thrill of mobbing through a city thats his for the taking, but even in joy theres a note of tension and the ever-present possibility of actual danger. ("I aint rock my jewelry, and thats on purpose/ Niggas want my spot and dont deserve it.") Success creates as many problems as it solves.Music is the real joy for Drake, andIf Youre Reading This Its Too Lateis best enjoyed as an exercise in the casual excellence of the artist as rhymer and purveyor of hooks. The vocals are often just vampy flow experiments, but at their best these verses exhibit the weightless exhilaration of a technician at work. Drakes never more formidable than when hes shadowboxing, and at its flashiest,If Youre Reading This Its Too Latefeels like hisRockyrun. Inspired by gauntlet tosses from adversaries high and low, Drake uses the mixtape to toast and taunt a rogues gallery of industry frenemies. ForDiddy, who reportedly punched him over ownership of the beat for "0 to 100/The Catch Up": "Real quick, man, you couldntve hated that/ Lets be real, nigga, you couldntve made it that." For disgruntled labelmateTyga, who insulted Drake in aVibemagazine feature: "You need to act your age and not your girls age." For friend-turned-rivalKendrick Lamar: "They gon say your name on them airwaves/ They gon hit you after like its only rap."OnIf Youre Reading This, all of this chest beating is delivered over the most darkly hypnotic beats Drakes graced sinceSo Far Gone. Much of the mixtape foregoes the supervision of his producer-in-residence Noah "40" Shebib, but 40s codeine-soul aesthetic is the ghost in the machine. ThePARTYNEXTDOORshowcase "Wednesday Night Interlude" matches the OVO signees pleading vocal to a chunk of Canadian producer Ekalis ethereal"Unfaith", itself an interpolation ofCiaraandFutures"Body Party".GinuwineandTimbalands 2000 classic"So Anxious"is sampled twice, soundtracking the slow-cooking opener "Legend" and the 40 contribution "Madonna". Where R&B sounds arent incorporated directly, their thick sensuality is frequently hinted at. The pace of the mixtape rarely elevates past a crawl, reveling in the moody, winding instrumentals and hooky sentimentality of Boi-1da, PARTYNEXTDOOR and newcomers Wondagurl, SykSense, and Sevn Thomas without worrying about posting upbeat knockers to Top 40 radio.In the days to come youll read that Drake "pulled aBeyonc" with the stealth drop ofIf Youre Reading This, and yes, both are surprise releases from A-list artists topping the charts without a rollout or much in the way of an advance warning. ButRadioheadsIn Rainbowsis the better comparison: Both records found the artists revisiting the mood of a highly regarded early work as they transition into new methods of delivering music to fans. Whether the Drake tape is a clever track dump disguised as an album with the intent of worming out of his Cash Money deal, a deliberately planned gesture to tide fans over until the upcomingViews from the 6, or just an exercise in shirking the protracted waits and missed dates of the retail rap game,If Youre Reading This Its Too Latewinningly employs the occasion of theSo Far Goneanniversary to revisit the twilight consternation of Drakes breakout release, perhaps to close out a chapter of his career on the same note on which it began.