while garnering the anticipation for the album, big sean released the mixtape "detroit" on september 5, 2012. the mixtape consisted of previously unreleased songs. the mixtape features guest appearances from fellow rappers j. cole, juicy j, king chip, french montana, royce da 5'9", kendrick lamar, tyga, chris brown, wale and wiz khalifa, along with track narrations by common, jeezy and snoop dogg. production was provided by hit-boy, da internz, lex luger and key wane. before the album's release, big sean released a handful of his inspirational video blogs, which gets in touch on how far he has gotten to where he's at throughout his career and what he plans on doing to further his position in music. most of his vlogs feature cameo appearances from kanye west, 2 chainz, pusha t, common, no i.d., rita ora, trey songz, wale, wiz khalifa, lupe fiasco, teyana taylor and t-pain, among others. starting on february 23, 2013, sean began a european tour in promotion of the album, which continued until march 13, 2013. on september 28, 2013, sean released a 23-minute documentary covering the development and making of the album, which began 269 days before the project's release.