Prior to the release of Scorpion, Drake shared a photo of DJ Premier on his Instagram Story which made many people assume that we could expect the legendary producer to contribute to the tracklist in some sort of way. As the project dropped, the speculations were true and Premier's production on "Sandra's Rose" made it one of the project's highlights. In a recent interview, Premier explained how the song came about.
DJ Premier explained to The Fader that he and Drake have spoke about working together for years. Premier's manager told him to try and get on Scorpion although the producer admits he doesn't like asking people to get on their records. However, Premier reached out to 40 who told him that they needed a beat. 40 connected Premier with one of OVO's new signees, Maneesh, who created a sample sound Drake wanted to use.
"Maneesh gave me the "Sandra's Rose" sample and I sent it back at like four in the morning, the night I worked on it, maybe closer to five." He explained, "I get up very early — I take my son to school — I wake up 6:30 or 7 in the morning. As soon as I woke up, the first thing I said when I opened my eyes was "thank you." Soon as I said that, the phone did the iPhone alert, the doo-doo-doo. When I looked it was 40. I figured he was going to say, "I got the beat I heard it, Drake's gonna listen to it." It was a video with the vocals already laid. That was a short window from me sending it, going to sleep, and waking up and it's already done."
Premier also revealed that he produced another track called "Sail" which was meant for Rick Ross and Drake. He said Ross' vocals were on the track but Drake never actually added his. Maybe we'll end up getting that track one day.
