Lil Wayne‘s latest single off his Tha Carter IV album featuring Drake, “She Will“, has debuted at #3 on Billboard‘s Hot 100! This is Weezy‘s highest-ever opening rank on the chart, and it also marks Wayne‘s top 10 Hot 100 debut, pushing him past other male artists such as: Eminem and Kanye West. “She Will” is the fourth entry on the Hot 100 chart from Tune‘s C4 album too, as “6 Foot, 7 Foot” featuring Cory Gunz reached #9, “John” featuring Rick Ross reached #22, and “How To Love” reached #5.

Hit the jump to read who CMB are about to sign next to their label, and what Cortez Bryant (Wayne’s manager) and Birdman said to Rolling Stone on August 24h about how they have stopped Tunechi‘s Tha Carter IV album leaking so early like Tha Carter III did back in 2008.

“I think we’re lucky this time.” Bryant said of Wayne’s ninth album, which was officially set to premiere on iTunes at midnight on August 29th after his closing performance at the MTV Video Music Awards, and everywhere else that same day. “We held it until the last moment we could, and we didn’t send any songs or beats by e-mail – we used iChat, or a person had to get on a plane to share music…I’m knocking on wood before I get off the phone with you and it’s all over the Internet.”

Hours later, Tha Carter IV leaked. As fans sucked up bandwidth to download it, others wondered exactly what artists have to do to keep a hot album under wraps: Hotel studio sessions? Pelican briefcases? Biometric fingerprint detectors?

Wayne is no stranger to controversial rollouts: I Am Not a Human Being, released while the MC was still in prison, was a digital-only album for two weeks before CDs were let loose. Bryan “Birdman” Williams, CEO of Cash Money Records, says Wayne went the equal-opportunity route this time because those tactics “just piss everybody off. This is one of the biggest releases of the year, and we wanted to make sure that everybody got to play their part at the same time.”

Cash Money delivered Carter IV to Universal about 10 days in advance, which Williams says was necessary to press the two million units being shipped in its first week. “The goal is to sell a million-plus copies,” he explains. Although that’s likely what led to Carter IV breaking free, Williams says he’s actually OK with leaks, to a point. “I can deal with it for short period of time,” he says. It’s when you have a leak out for a long time that it’s crazy.”

In Cash Money news, the label are about to sign an internationally known pop group, who go by the name of Savvy:

Cash Money Records will expand the roster next week when they officially welcome the first pop group to their label. Internationally known pop band Savvy has inked a deal with Cash Money Records.

Savvy, the label’s latest acquisition, is an internationally known six–member teen band that’s featured in the international TV show “The Wannabes,” which will premiere in North America on September 5th on Starz Kids & Family. The group will be introduced to North America via their upcoming debut album for Cash Money Records.

This Monday (August 29th), Cash Money’s CEO’s, Bryan “Birdman” Williams and his brother, Co-CEO Ronald “Slim” Williams, will be on hand to welcome the group to Cash Money Records. The brothers will preside over a swanky event at 11:00 AM at The Montage Hotel, which is located in Beverly Hills. – AHH

In the video above, you can watch the official trailer for Lil Wayne‘s Tha Carter IV album. Even though the trailer looks fan-made and was just made up of old Tunechi music videos, it was uploaded to Universal’s official YouTube channel.

Universal also sent out the link to pre-order Weezy‘s C4 album from Amazon, and you can do that here!

The only worrying thing about this trailer and link, is that it does not say anywhere the date for when the album will be released.

Ever since Lil Wayne‘s Tha Carter III was released on August 19th, 2008, everyone’s been anticipating the next chapter of Tha Carter series, Tha Carter IV. The anticipation grew more once Wayne was sentenced to a year in prison, due to a felony gun charge. The hype of the album is so big, that Complex considered it in their “25 Most Anticipated Albums Of 2010″. Lil Wayne‘s Tha Carter IV made #7 on the list, which may be a disappointment to most of his fans. But despite it’s lower-than-expected ranking, it’ll be an album to remember. Here’s what Complex had to say:

During last summer Universal said this record would be released in the 4th quarter of 2009, after Rebirth, so clearly there are songs recorded. But with Rebirth’s release at a standstill due to lack of interest and the Best Rapper Alive ‘pon lock for most of 2010, we’re thinking Universal, and more importantly their shareholders, are gonna force this LP’s release by the end of the year. The big question is, will it be a frankenstein of the rap records he’s made post-Rebirth, or will he scrap everything when he gets out of jail and put together an entirely new LP reflecting his presumably changed world view?

What do you guys think about Tha Carter IV only reaching the #7 spot, and do you all think it will be released this year?

Shouts to Complex

Lil Wayne‘s Rebirth has seen constant delays over the past year, but for once, the album is not being pushed back.

Contrary to reports that it had been moved to June, the rapper’s oft-delayed foray into rock is still scheduled for release on February 2, Universal Motown confirms to Rap-Up.com. Exactly one week later on February 9, Wayne is likely to be sentenced and report to prison for almost a year on gun charges.

Rebirth surfaced online when it was prematurely shipped to around 500 Amazon.com customers last month. The final tracklisting may change due to the leak.

Shouts to Rap-Up

After much delay, Lil Wayne‘s highly-anticipated rock album, “Rebirth,” is now slated for a Dec. 15 release date according to the Universal Music Group website. The set will be packaged as a dual-disc along with the Young Money collective, “We Are Young Money.”

Originally scheduled for April 7, the first single off the set titled “Prom Queen,” produced by Infamous and Andrew “Drew” Correa, reached no. 15 on the Billboard Hot 100. Second single “Hot Revolver” debuted at No. 33 on the same tally.

In addition to Infamous and Correa, producers Cool and Dre and Develop also have tracks on “Rebirth,” while Fall Out Boy is featured. The latter comes after their first collaboration on Fall Out Boy’s 2008 release, “Folie à Deux.” Lenny Kravitz, Travis Barker and Young Money/Cash Money artist Drake also appear on the set.

Although the album is mostly rock inspired, with Lil Wayne playing guitar on most of the tracks, the leaked song, “Fix My Hat,” produced by Drew Money, is one of the few rap tracks that made it onto the “Rebirth” set.

Shouts to Billboard, and I know most of us all knew that “Rebirth” was coming out on December 15, but Universal has just recently confirmed that the album is dropping on Dec 15th along with Young Money‘s “We Are Young Money” as a dual-disc.

Also, help Lil Wayne get his “Lollipop” music video number 1 on Fuse’s Hip Hop Invasion by voting here.

The Cash Money fam arrive back in the US from just being on a Europe tour in the video above. They go to Universal to do some business, and even check out the artwork for Birdman‘s Priceless album. Then they head to a party where Jay Sean is performing at, and hand him a present.

Previously: Video: Young Money & Cash Money In Paris (Day 6 & 7)

Props Derick G

Enjoy

In the video above, KiD CuDi speaks on his and Lil Wayne‘s relationship together. Unfortunately, the audio is bad quality, so you can only just make out what CuDi is saying.

Also, in the image below Chris Brown has updated us with some more info on the “Transformer” track featuring Lil Wayne.

So it looks like Swizz Beatz produced the record and Wayne spitted some crazy bars in his verse

Expect this track to drop within the next two weeks

“To go independent is — like I said in a prior interview — it’s a funny term,” Drake told MTV News on Tuesday, addressing the deal that finds his albums being released on Wayne’s independent Young Money label (which is affiliated with Cash Money Records) and being distributed by the major Universal Republic. “Because it’s almost impossible to go fully independent. This was basically like the closest thing I could get to my own independence, to sort of continuing to be that guy to the fans that, you know, is trying to prove something — trying to prove that it can be done. So with that being said, I signed directly to Cortez Bryant and Gee Roberson, my two managers, and their company Inspire. It’s a joint venture with Young Money, so that’s the deal. I know there’s been a lot of stuff on the Internet about different entities, but that’s the people involved in the main record deal. And then it’s distributed through Universal, so it’s great, man. You know, if we can sell some records I think it could be a pretty legendary situation.”

Although Drake decided to stay with his managers (who also manage Lil Wayne), he said he loved the courting process.

“Well, the whole thing with me was, I met some great people along the way. Warner Music’s Lyor Cohen is such a special man to me, even though I am signed where I am signed at. You know, Interscope head Jimmy Iovine, same thing, a great person that taught me a lot in a very short period of time. But my loyalty lays with Wayne. For him to be able to benefit from the situation and for us to be able to brand Young Money, this is the route that I went.

“I plan to work with Wayne for the rest of my career so I think it’s a smart career move,” he added. “You know, everybody else on Young Money will hopefully work out the situations, get the right people on the album. I think it was important for me to show him that I believed in him as much as he believed in me. Because a lot of months he stuck his neck out there for me, you know with the VMAs, and then ‘Ransom,’ and all the songs that we put out. And the things he would say in interviews, he really put himself out there for me. So I think it was only just and fair to show him that I feel the same way.”

Shouts to MTV and I can’t believe how much Drake I am posting on this website now – But at least, this has something to do with Weezy

Bryant says the Toronto rapper was already signed to Young Money Entertainment, but signed his distribution deal on Sunday. “We were looking for all the creative control and all the say-so over the project,” said Bryant, “the person who gave us the sweetest deal.”

Drake, who Bryant says is ecstatic about the signing, will appear on one of two follow-up singles to Young Money’s hit “Every Girl,” slated to drop in the next two weeks.

Drake’s debut album, Thank Me Later, has no release date, but Bryant says the Young Money group album is expected to drop late this year, on the same day as Lil Wayne’s Rebirth.

Shout outs to XXL Mag

Well, the wait is over: After weeks of speculation, Drake has chosen to go with the home team and sign with Lil Wayne‘s Young Money Records, according to a source close to the situation. The deal breaks down as a joint venture between Young Money and Cash Money, with Universal Republic distributing. Drake‘s management was adamant that he should be viewed as an independent artist, although Universal will distribute the project.

“Today is a definitely a comfortable day for me, having my team now that’s been in place for a couple of years. It’s just a great day,” Drake said. “It’s something new, but it feels familiar.”

Drizzy is excited about having a corporate push to help with the momentum he’s gained independently.

“Independent is a funny term,” he told MTV News on the set of his video for “Best I Ever Had.” “I can go independent, but you need distribution, period. You need somebody to distribute your record and you need that army that a label has to really push the record.”

Shout outs to MTV! So what y’all think about this I think this is great news and I wonder if Nicki Minaj will do the same…