DS2
1 Week On The Billboard 200
WHAT A TIME TO BE ALIVE (WITH DRAKE)
1 Week On The Billboard 200
“This is the house that Future built,” Epic Records chairman/CEO Antonio “L.A.” Reid, 59, says one November afternoon at the label’s offices in Manhattan. He’s toasting the efforts of his staff for helping the rapper, 32, send not one, but two albums to the top of the Billboard 200 in 2015, an especially notable triumph after the disappointing performance of 2014’s scattershot Honest. Returning to his core sound but utilizing an up-to-the-minute surprise-release rollout strategy, the Atlanta native dialed down the pop-leaning fare for the releases DS2 and What a Time to Be Alive, his collaborative album with Drake. The subsequent No. 1s came just weeks apart.
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FUTURE The way that people received [Honest] was a big disconnect. Sonically, I wasn’t telling the story that I wanted to tell. I just did it my way this time [with DS2]. I didn’t have any expectations. It’s a blessing to have a No. 1 album.
REID Many of us can’t decode it, but Future and his fans, they all speak in code, so they knew [DS2] was coming. I could bullshit if you’d like, but the truth is I knew it would be the No. 1 album. Future had figured it out. This album probably should have been called Honest. This is just the tip of the iceberg. I really believe that — pun intended — he is the future.
FUTURE Music is a competition between me and myself. I have to do better, make better songs. Other artists, they compete with themselves. I always try to top myself to be the MVP, to get the championship. After the championship, you get the hall of fame. You have to think ahead of the curve. That’s my 2016 plan. I want to continue moving at a certain pace, be consistent with what I’m doing. Not trying anything new, not just pull a trick out of the bag. Everything I do, I just want to be perfect.
This story originally appeared in the Dec. 19 issue of Billboard.