On Wednesday, 18 January 2023, a J. Cole unreleased song gained traction online.

Producer Bvtman unleashed the rapper’s new track “Procrastination (Broke),” along with a text message about its origin. The sender, presumably Cole, admits the song was never supposed to see the light of day, but decided to release it as a “thank you” to Bvtman as well as “every producer out there cooking up and sharing their work with the world.”

The message states Cole was struggling to find inspiration one day and decided to simply search “J. Cole type beat” on YouTube. He was directed to Bvtman’s channel, which includes a heap of beats that pay homage to artists like Cole, Kendrick Lamar, Nipsey Hussle, Kanye West, 21 Savage, Drake, and more. Once he heard the “Procrastination” beat, Cole got out of his funk and began writing.

Read the full text,

“This song should live on your channel and serve as a thank you to you and every producer out there cooking up and sharing their work with the world. It’s a million artists out there right now just like me, hungry and searching every day for something to spark a word, a melody, a hook, a verse, a punchline, a way to vent, or a way to CUT THROUGH.

On a day when I couldn’t find much motivation, I was looking for anything to inspire me. Out of curiosity, I typed in ‘J. Cole type beat’ into YouTube. Yours was the first I saw. I pressed play, focused, and wrote this.

This is some shit that would normally stay in the vault, but I don’t want to hold onto the music like that no more. This is for you and whoever else need to hear it. God bless bro and keep doing what you do!”

Bvtman recalled driving on the highway when he randomly received a text message from Ibrahim”IB” Hamad, the co-founder of Dreamville Records and Cole’s longtime manager. IB informed the producer that Cole was a fan of his work, a moment Bvtman describes as unbelievable.

“If you know me, you know what this post means to me & what this song means to me,” he wrote in an IG caption. “If you know me you know this is my peace finally, my dream. … It’s crazy how this happened. Randomly driving on the high with my shorty and I get a text from [Ibrahim Hamad] saying [Cole] fuccs with my beats. I almost ain’t believe this was real life…. But it is.”