The tattoo artist who was put on blast by Drake over his dad's tattoo says it wasn't his fault the final product was far from perfect ... and it was straight-up disrespectful to get other artists to fix it.
Money Mike tells TMZ ... he met Drake's dad, Dennis Graham, at a birthday party in 2017 and hit him up to get Dennis' famous son inked on his upper arm. Mike even did it for free, despite not being a fan of Drake -- hoping to get more clients.
As we reported, Drake posted a pic of the tattoo Monday, clearly not feeling it -- captioning it with, "I was sitting here thinking why you do me like this we family 😂 😂." His dad commented, saying he's gotten it touched up 16 times since.
Mike admits the tat didn't come out as good as it could've, but that wasn't on him ... he claims Dennis was in pain at the 4-hour mark, and rushed Mike to finish the job.
Mike claims everyone in the fam was actually diggin' the art -- including Dennis -- but once Drake saw the tat everything changed.
BTW -- Mike says it's an unspoken rule in the tattoo game to not go over someone else's work ... something Drake clearly doesn't follow or respect.