Singles
The first promotional single from the album was "No Matter What". It was posted on StreetCred's website on April 29, 2008, as a promotional recording, then released as a single on May 6 along with a music video. The song narrates T.I. rising above his misfortunes, including a prison sentence for weapon charges.
On August 19, 2008, the first official single "Whatever You Like" was made available for digital download. The song reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 on September 6, 2008 and set a new record for biggest one-week jump to the top position, going from number seventy-one to number one, becoming his first number one song on the chart as a lead artist and best opening-week sales by a rap track since Nielsen SoundScan began compiling download data in 2003. T.I. announced that he was "ecstatic" and "overjoyed" after setting a record for the biggest jump to top of the Billboard Hot 100. After the success of "Whatever You Like", iTunes published the release dates for upcoming promo singles, including the song "Swing Ya Rag" on August 26, "What Up, What's Haapnin'" on September 2 and "Ready for Whatever" on September 23, 2008.
On August 22, 2008, the songs "Like I Do" featuring The-Dream, "Let My Beat Pound", "My Life Your Entertainment" featuring Usher, and "Swagga Like Us" were all leaked to the internet. "Swagga Like Us", a song with T.I., Jay-Z, Lil Wayne and Kanye West - which samples "Paper Planes" by M.I.A. - was then released as a single for Paper Trail and debuted in the Hot 100 at number five. The album's third main single, "Live Your Life" featuring Rihanna, broke the record for biggest leap to number one, when it jumped from number eighty to number one on the Hot 100, giving T.I. his second Hot 100 number one as a lead artist, and Rihanna her fifth overall. The song also set a first week digital record, when it sold 334,000 digital downloads in its first week of availability, a record that was previously held by Mariah Carey's "Touch My Body."
The fourth main single was confirmed to be "Dead and Gone" featuring Justin Timberlake by co-producer Rob Knox. T.I. later confirmed the release of the single. The song was charted by Billboard before the announcement of the single. The song reached number two on the Billboard Hot 100 on February 27, 2009. Overall, eight songs from the album charted on the Billboard Hot 100 including the four main singles, "56 Bars (Intro)", "I'm Illy", "Ready for Whatever", and "My Life Your Entertainment" despite not being singles. The song "56 Bars (Intro)" features T.I. freestyling 56 straight bars. A music video was released for the song "Slide Show" which highlighted a photo collage that followed T.I.'s career as a recording artist.
Read more about this topic: Paper Trail