Drake Scraps Posthumous Aaliyah Album

Two years ago, producer Noah “40″ Shebib announced that he and singer Drake would be putting together a posthumous Aaliyah album using unreleased recordings from the late R&B singer’s catalog. The news was met with mixed reaction.

With all the criticism surrounding the news of the posthumous album, 40 opted to abandon the project, fearful of all the bad publicity. The producer officially explained why he decided scrape the album:

“I was naïve to the politics surrounding Aaliyah’s legacy and a bit ignorant to Timbaland’s relationship and everybody else involved and how they’d feel. Tim said to me ‘Don’t stop, make the album.’ I think that was Tim taking the position of, ‘I’m not going to stop you. If you’re not going to do it, that’s your decision.’ But ultimately, I wasn’t comfortable and didn’t like the stigma. We released [“Enough Said”], but I was seven songs deep. [Aaliyah’s] mother saying ‘I don’t want this out’ was enough for me. I walked away very quickly.”

In 2012, Drake revealed the song titled “Enough Said”, featuring a previously unreleased vocal hook from Aaliyah. Listen to “Enough Said” below:

It is unclear whether or not the other songs 40 and Drake recorded will ever be released.

Aaliyah Dana Haughton released her debut album, Age Ain’t Nothing But A Number, in 1994. It was followed in 1996 by One In A Million and her 2001 self-titled third album, which was released just a month prior to her fatal plane crash.  The album has since sold over 13 million copies.