The Unspoken Truth: Exploitation in the Music Industry

[00:00:30] - [Sir Daniel]
Greetings, and welcome back to cue points podcast. I am DJ Sir Daniel.

[00:00:35] - [Jay Ray]
And my name is Jay Ray, sometimes known by my governments as Johnny Ray Cornegie the third. What's happening, people?

[00:00:43] - [Sir Daniel]
People, welcome back to cue points podcast, the podcast that is dropping the needle on black music history. Jay Rabe, how are you doing?

[00:00:53] - [Jay Ray]
I am excellent, man. Like, it's been busy, of course. You know what I'm saying? It's definitely been busy. But you know what?

[00:01:03] - [Jay Ray]
I'm really inspired. I'm excited for what we do here at QPoints. I'm excited for stuff that's going on with the family. I'm feeling really good. How are you doing?

[00:01:14] - [Sir Daniel]
I am excellent as well. I'm very excited to have this discussion

[00:01:19] - [Jay Ray]
Mhmm.

[00:01:20] - [Sir Daniel]
On this particular episode. I'm really happy about the work that we've been doing, the our social media, you know, outreach, and just having a good time making connections with all of you listeners and just growing our listener family because cue points podcast has something for everyone. And so this particular episode is no different. But before we delve into all of that, J Ray, please let the new listeners know what they can do to make sure that they are a full fledged part of the cue points podcast family.

[00:01:55] - [Jay Ray]
Listen. There are so many things. But before I do that, sir Daniel Yes. For the cue points family, I just wanna thank you, sir Daniel, for your brilliance and all the social media engagement. No.

[00:02:08] - [Jay Ray]
Real talk. Like, it's it's a gift that you have, and I thank you for being able to do that for us because it makes a difference. And we see that it's already connecting with so many new folks. So thank you, bro,

[00:02:22] - [Sir Daniel]
I appreciate that. It's look. It's all for the good for the good of the QPoints podcast.

[00:02:27] - [Jay Ray]
Yes. Yes. So to to sir Daniel's point, you all are already doing the thing that you really need to be doing if you hear us right now. Right? So if you hear this message, that means you are listening or watching the show, and that's great.

[00:02:45] - [Jay Ray]
We absolutely need you to do that. Go one step further and left click on the subscribe button wherever you are so that you can get notified whenever there is a new episode of cue points that's really dope. And that's completely free. The other free layer to that that you can do, and we always say this, share it with your friends. Like sir Daniel and I recognize that the way that we need to grow cue points is through all of y'all.

[00:03:12] - [Jay Ray]
So if you like cue points and you like, I like what those brothers are doing over there, they're not over there talking no foolishness, Share it with your friends your family and your colleagues that you think might be into black music and the way that we talk about it here because they'll listen to you because you're their friend or their family or a colleague. Right? So that's dope. The other thing that you can do, go on over to our newsletter. We have magazine.qpoints.com.

[00:03:38] - [Jay Ray]
We are about

[00:03:39] - [Sir Daniel]
It's so good.

[00:03:40] - [Jay Ray]
It's so It is where we expound on the content in the show. So we will post videos that we kinda talk about, music and stuff that we talk about on the show, so you can hear that. So stay up with our newsletter so that you can know how to get up, so that you could really get in the know and be a QPoints insider. It's so good. So, yeah, those are all the things that y'all can do.

[00:04:06] - [Jay Ray]
Thank you all for being here.

[00:04:07] - [Sir Daniel]
Like Jay Ray said, you gotta stay up so you can get down with the cue points. Right. Music industry, just based on the way it's set up, has been known to divide people who have come into the game as friends, as brothers, as sisters, and can actually cause a, a division in them. And the music industry itself is proving to be a a very nefarious and just really icky. Over the past few weeks, like, there has been a reckoning within this industry, and a lot of powerful names have been named, accused.

[00:04:58] - [Sir Daniel]
Some very explicit and implicit lawsuits have been made public. Things are that have been done in the dark are being brought to the light at this point, and it's a reckoning for certain people. Of course, you know, we know all about, you know, Sean Puffy Combs is his that name is being dragged through the mud. Something serious right now. He's being separated.

[00:05:19] - [Jay Ray]
Allegedly. There's a lot of allegedly with with Sean with Diddy. But allegedly but, yes. Allegedly. All of this is happening.

[00:05:27] - [Sir Daniel]
He's being separated from a lot of from corporations and stepping asked to step down from this and that. And, you know, it's it's a serious thing. People It is. Businesses are separating themselves from him because, you know, J Ray, let's just be real. The name Sean Puffy Combs has had a cloud covering it from the very beginning, from the get go.

[00:05:53] - [Sir Daniel]
Like, even way back to the city college incident, there has been a dark cloud of energy, bad energy that has followed Diddy around, and it's nothing new. We joke about it. We laugh about how, you know, you know, people that get signed to to to Bad Boy Records just never see any money. They end up broke or they get murdered or they die penniless, all types of things. So, you know, it's that's not a secret.

[00:06:22] - [Sir Daniel]
And I think that it's just one of those things that we now, with Cassie Ventura's very direct lawsuit and and plain spelling out of incidents that this man has put her through over the decade that they were together just got us to talking about what is it about this industry that gestates this kind of negative energy that that encourages and creates people to become predators, especially with people that look like them? There's something about this industry that encourages this, J Ray. Yes. And I you know, just in us talking, why do you think that this industry is so dang toxic?

[00:07:14] - [Jay Ray]
Yeah. A couple of things. So the first thing that comes to mind is the fact that there is so much money to be made Mhmm. In a complicated industry that is difficult to understand for most people because of the way the system is constructed. Your your goal is to figure out how to make a coin, right, off of someone else's talent.

[00:07:58] - [Sir Daniel]
Mhmm.

[00:07:59] - [Jay Ray]
But not everybody can figure out the game. Right? So I think that's one thing. Right? Is the industry, the way the system is set up, is it encourages people in one way or one way or another, because they're motivated by money, to engage in predatory behavior.

[00:08:26] - [Jay Ray]
So that's one thing. The other thing that I think that makes the industry really toxic is, you know, you're just dealing with We're talking about artists. Right? So we're talking about music. We are talking about the fact that there are going to be folks with a lot of trauma who are brilliant artists.

[00:08:50] - [Jay Ray]
Right? We talk about that all the time, whereas they call it the torture genius. Where it's that's just like just part of it. Right? So you end up chock full of an industry of money, you know, money grubbing folks, torture geniuses, people who are incredibly talented and don't understand what's going on.

[00:09:19] - [Jay Ray]
It and Kandi Burroughs said something recently, where she was just like, and also in the music business, there's just like, it's just shady. Like, there's just no, there's no rules. You know what I'm saying?

[00:09:38] - [Sir Daniel]
Right.

[00:09:39] - [Jay Ray]
So I think that's why.

[00:09:42] - [Sir Daniel]
I think Q Tip said it best, you know, industry rule number 4,080, record people are shady. To all of your points, you get a industry full of let's talk about the artists, tortured geniuses. Right? Also, very insecure people. A lot of times, very insecure because a lot of the artists come into the game at a very young age.

[00:10:08] - [Sir Daniel]
They come in as adolescents when they're not even fully developed adults. Their frontal lobe hasn't even fully developed. So a lot of their executive decisions are flawed because they're not fully formed yet, and they're not full fledged adults. So you got that. And then you've got it comp you compound that with a majority, and we're gonna talk specifically about black music and black musicians and artists.

[00:10:33] - [Sir Daniel]
A lot of them come from poverty. A lot of them are already vulnerable because they come from backgrounds that don't allow for them to not turn down a janky deal and $500 upfront because that $500 means it's probably the most money they've ever seen in their life and can be can mean groceries for the family back home as well. So there's that. And I think I said this on the episode before. The music industry is a glamorized pyramid scheme.

[00:11:08] - [Sir Daniel]
It is bay it is built on the on the principle of, okay. I'm gonna I'm gonna give you money to go and find two more people to come work under you. And for every person that you bring in, I'm gonna give you a bonus so that you can pay them a little bit of money, and then they do the same thing. And at the same time, they're making brilliant music, and but I'm gonna get the lion's share of the money because I'm at the top of the period pyramid. And that system, like racism and white supremacy, which are they both go hand in hand, quite honestly, is built for people not to succeed, not to become billionaires like the people at the top of the pyramid.

[00:11:56] - [Sir Daniel]
So what you have, you know, if you you find these young people and thank you, Meredith. New edition is a great example. You find you find five young boys from the projects in Boston. Dirt poor, right, living in the projects, and you you hit them off with a little bit of money. They're vulnerable.

[00:12:15] - [Sir Daniel]
They're out on the road performing their little hearts out because all they wanna do is sing for you and perform for you. And but they're still adolescents. So what do you have to do? What do you gotta do? You gotta entertain them by giving them food, entertain them with all kinds of foolishness, introduce them to liquor because that helps to calm them down when you need them to be calm.

[00:12:38] - [Sir Daniel]
And then there's always somebody lingering around with the with with drugs, hard powder, everything you could think of that will either boost you up so you can go out there and perform your heart out on stage. Or and when you can't get when you come off stage and you can't go to sleep and you can't calm down, they got something that'll bring you down. So then if you and so if you're already vulnerable and if you have the proclivity to become an addict, guess what? You're now a drug addict with access to a little bit of money, which you are not gonna hold on to for a while. So that's just part of the system is just built that way for for specifically black people who give of their soul to this to this art not to succeed.

[00:13:29] - [Sir Daniel]
And quite frankly, you're worth more money dead to a lot of these corporations than you are alive.

[00:13:36] - [Jay Ray]
Bruh, you Yeah. That's that's a mic drop because that's absolutely true. You said something there that I feel like is really important. When you When we think about the system as it is set up currently Mhmm. You You're already in the hole if you decide if you decide that you're going to enter the system, you're going to enter the music business in kind of the the big the big system.

[00:14:17] - [Jay Ray]
Right? You're going to enter into these big doors. Right? Because there is an opportunity I know a bunch of independent musicians that live really regular lives, they make livings off of their music, but they're not in the big machine. Right?

[00:14:31] - [Jay Ray]
They're in their own machine. A whole different experience. Right? We're talking about the people over here in the big machine. If you decide to enter the big machine, you already owe them money.

[00:14:45] - [Jay Ray]
Like, you can't, like, you have to make so much money to recoup all of the money that gets spent, right? Which we've seen some people like climb out of this. Like, I'm looking at Beyonce, I'm looking at Rihanna, I'm looking at these artists, but look how hard Let's just take those women. Look how hard those women had to work to be in control of their own art.

[00:15:15] - [Sir Daniel]
And look how few of them there are.

[00:15:17] - [Jay Ray]
Baby, say that.

[00:15:21] - [Sir Daniel]
There's all there's not even a handful of artists that can say that have the independence that J Ray is speaking on. And just as you were talking, J Ray, just like predator we're talking about predatory nature of this. This is predatory lending. A lot of recording contracts are predatory loans, basically.

[00:15:40] - [Jay Ray]
That's a quotable. Like, record contracts is is are like those predatory loans. Oh my god.

[00:15:48] - [Sir Daniel]
You may look. You may as well you may as well be getting your recording contract from a title Yeah. Loan place. You may as well. Because you are going to have to earn you are really gonna have to make some money in order to get back to make that recoup what it is that they spent on you.

[00:16:07] - [Sir Daniel]
And so, you know, we've discussed we've discussed the money aspect, but we touched on, you know, the whole ditty conversation. I just and just veering off of script real quick. I just don't get it. Part of me is like, you know what these kids go through. You know the dreams that they have.

[00:16:33] - [Sir Daniel]
These are people that look like you that came from the same place you came from. And so I'm just wondering where along what point do you kinda do you lose your humanity and not look at them as little brothers, little sisters, you know, from around your way and not try to look out for them in the in the larger sense of the word.

[00:16:58] - [Jay Ray]
Man, sir Daniel, there are unfortunately just always people who just aren't good people. You know what I'm saying? Like, they just aren't they just aren't good people who are going to do right by folks because they are more interested in what they can get. I think, to your earlier point, I think racism and white supremacy encourages it. I think in the sense of American, I think American individualism and exceptionalism encourages it, capitalism encourages it, and yo, people get real I don't know what it's like to have a million dollars.

[00:17:53] - [Jay Ray]
I don't know what it's like to have a $100,000 in my bank account. I don't know what that's like. Right? There are folks out there that do, and what is the old saying, money is the root of all evil?

[00:18:07] - [Sir Daniel]
Right. The love of money is the root

[00:18:09] - [Jay Ray]
of The all love the love. Oh, thank you so much for that.

[00:18:12] - [Sir Daniel]
Because money is fine. I money is great.

[00:18:15] - [Jay Ray]
Some of that, but it's the love. There you go. Right? Me and sir Daniel, we calling it in. Right?

[00:18:19] - [Jay Ray]
2024. Bring it. But I you that love of money thing. That love

[00:18:24] - [Sir Daniel]
Yeah.

[00:18:25] - [Jay Ray]
The love of the money. So if that's your first thing, if you like to get the bag first, the people second, that's we we always we need to know when to recognize those people Mhmm. Because it will determine how those people interact with you. And it will determine what they will do to get the money. And if they need to throw you under the bus to get the money, you done.

[00:18:54] - [Sir Daniel]
You're done. And, you know, this the system, the the the music system is a quid pro quo system. And it's like, what are a lot of them, a lot of artists are asked point blank, what are you willing to do to become famous? And I think it's it's almost like that, you know, for those of you who went to vacation bible school, those of us that, you know, went to Sunday school, Sabbath school, and all that, we all heard about the story of of when Jesus and, you know, Satan were were chilling, you know, looking over the land, and Satan was like, you know what? If you just, you know, you just hang come come on my team, get with the winning team, you know, all of this can be yours.

[00:19:43] - [Sir Daniel]
And, you know, it was just tempting Jesus with the run of the land and, like, and telling him, oh, you know, I can get you riches. I can you know, you could do this. You could be in charge of this part of the world and have the control over this whole world, blah blah blah. And all of us have those moments is and a lot of artists had that moment where the the person in charge or the person the dream the dream fulfiller comes to them and says, what are you willing to give up? What do you wanna do?

[00:20:17] - [Sir Daniel]
What are you willing to give of yourself, of your soul in order to get to those riches, in order to get to fame? And let's not even discuss the fame drug because fame is a drug in and of itself. But

[00:20:32] - [Jay Ray]
The fame monster is what Mhmm. What's her name? Lady Gaga said. Mhmm.

[00:20:37] - [Sir Daniel]
It's so it's like, what are you willing to give? And, you know, quite quite frankly, a lot of young people, again, who aren't able to make better executive decisions say, you know what? I'm willing to do anything. And, again, it's just like J Ray, it's just like working with people that are sex trafficked. You know, you get they're vulnerable as hell.

[00:21:03] - [Sir Daniel]
Mhmm. They don't know where the next meal is coming from. They're disenfranchised from their family. So many things already make them susceptible, and here you come, you know, flashing the green and the luxury and whatnot. And they're like, I'm willing to do every anything.

[00:21:19] - [Sir Daniel]
And that includes, yes, I'm willing to rehearse and sing and and write and do all of that stuff, but I'm willing to possibly give part my body away. And that's a real thing that a dirty secret that people, I think, are now becoming more comfortable discussing with regards to this industry of music?

[00:21:44] - [Jay Ray]
You know, I I want to thank you for illuminating that because I think one of the things that we've talked about offline, and I think it's important to say here is that QPoints is a place that, one, supports black women, believes black women, and just in the greater scheme of things is interested in lifting up the voices of folks who have been harmed, folks who are survivors, etcetera. What Cassie did was really difficult. What Drew Dixon did was really difficult. What all of them sis all of them sisters that got R Kelly behind bars did was really difficult because these are folks, these are men that have power, resources, money, and more importantly, people that will blindly follow them.

[00:23:02] - [Sir Daniel]
I think that's the scariest part.

[00:23:04] - [Jay Ray]
That's the that is the scariest part where when we take a look when we take a step back and we hear and we I wasn't gonna read the 35 pages of Cassie because what I heard was like, you know what, I'm good on that. I don't want that in my spirit. Right? But when we think about all of that that goes into all of everything that goes into needing to reveal all of that, we're learning a lot about in this moment, about how people have operated. And I think there's gonna be more.

[00:23:40] - [Sir Daniel]
There's absolutely gonna be more. And what a lot of people have said oh, no. I take that back. I said this, full transparency, when the Cassie news dropped, I you know, I was basically like, the I'm this is not surprising. Mhmm.

[00:23:57] - [Sir Daniel]
This particular gentleman, his name has been there have been rumors following him. I mean, they linger on him more than Sean John Cologne. They have been following him for decades, these these rumors, these myths of sex parties, all of that stuff, and somebody just basically cosigned and say, yeah. If those things are true, they happened to me. But I I said all that to say that I was surprised that it wasn't a young man because those have been rumors too.

[00:24:27] - [Sir Daniel]
And it brought got me to thinking about I just recently saw the Milly Vanilli documentary. Is that HBO? Is that

[00:24:38] - [Jay Ray]
Paramount plus.

[00:24:39] - [Sir Daniel]
Paramount plus. Yes. And I tweeted about it after I watched it. J Ray, it was you know, because that that's like going in the time machine for us. It is.

[00:24:49] - [Sir Daniel]
Because that was a you know, that was we were kids when that stuff was happening, and it was a great time. It was nostalgic. I laughed. I I I danced around a little bit because listen. The music was kinda fire.

[00:25:03] - [Sir Daniel]
The music was still fire. And I went from joy to cringing to straight full on rage by the time I got to the end of that documentary because Rob and Fab were straight up victims of a very dangerous and nefarious system. That man what is his name again?

[00:25:29] - [Jay Ray]
Frank

[00:25:30] - [Sir Daniel]
ferrying. Frank Ferrying sought them out. Well, he would've saw if it would've been two other people, two other men, young boys, he would've gotten them because, historically, he all he did the same thing with another black artist, Bony m, And he historically would use them, use their black bodies

[00:25:54] - [Jay Ray]
Yep.

[00:25:55] - [Sir Daniel]
To present his music, to present his voice to the world, but use your black body to present it and use you up and put you on the front line as the face of his music and basically set you up to be the fall guy, which is what happened to Rob and Fab of Milly Vanilli. They were set up from the very beginning. And when when the shit hit the fan, Jay Ray, he backed away. Had nothing to do with it. Didn't want anything to do with them.

[00:26:29] - [Sir Daniel]
Forced them to go ahead and make a statement. And when the question started being directed at him, oh, well, you know, I told them not to do to perform on the Grammy. You paid for them to perform on the Grammys. And it's just it just incensed me because, again, white supremacy, the the the chattel and use of black bodies and capitalizing on black bodies for their greater good because who got all the money? Baby, Frank was paid.

[00:27:04] - [Jay Ray]
Frank and Ingrid sitting, okay. Ingrid made me mad. Was like, Who's what you're not worst. What you're not going to do, Ingrid, is how much you loved Rob. Oh, I loved I loved him.

[00:27:17] - [Jay Ray]
I loved him. I loved him. Really, girl? What you needed to be sitting up in that chair and doing is apologizing for your role in that foolishness? So Ingrid, if you see this, we not feeling you.

[00:27:30] - [Jay Ray]
We not feeling you. We You should have been apologizing to those men for what y'all did to them.

[00:27:38] - [Sir Daniel]
Save those crocodile tears, Ingrid. You know, I think the the nastiest the nastiest work that Frank that Farrin did was showing up to the funeral and hopping in front of the cameras to to look so stoic and so depressed and so unhappy. Oh, you were loved, Rob. You were loved, Rob. I'm like, get the get the out of here with that.

[00:28:04] - [Sir Daniel]
You know? Just just so unfeeling, just so unhuman, and just and nasty. Just a lot of nasty work when it comes to what happened to those two young men.

[00:28:16] - [Jay Ray]
Yeah. You brought up a really important point. And and this is the this is one of the things about the the the entertainment industry. Thank you Meredith for saying that because this is really truly the entertainment industry as a whole,

[00:28:33] - [Sir Daniel]
Not As a whole, yeah.

[00:28:35] - [Jay Ray]
But we end up doing the same thing that that white man did to Robin Fabb to our own people. You've already said this. And I think it's really important to underscore that Frank Farrion did had already done it with Boney M. Mhmm. Cast them out.

[00:28:57] - [Jay Ray]
Right? Bobby Farrell was broke and had fronted that band for years. Fronted the band, right, because it was really Then you Frank used to Farrion's voice. Mhmm. But then, okay, then he comes back and he does it again with Milli Vanilli, much bigger scale.

[00:29:16] - [Jay Ray]
And somebody made the great point of, oh, no, no, no. The Milli Vanillae train would've would've continued had that man not put them who ain't know nothing, had he put them in for the Grammy thing. And he that went, oh, that white man was so like, why don't y'all want these people to win a Grammy? True. Maybe you don't know that they're not singing?

[00:29:34] - [Jay Ray]
You know, it's a great song. Blame it on the rape. Why don't you He

[00:29:40] - [Sir Daniel]
was he was a he was an infant in the industry. He was like, you know, this is a great song. I think we should do this. And little did he know. Little did he know.

[00:29:49] - [Jay Ray]
Little did he know. What he

[00:29:51] - [Sir Daniel]
was doing. But go ahead.

[00:29:52] - [Jay Ray]
Right. And where where I wanted to get to, which was really because I didn't remember this because I checked out of the Milly Vanilli train after Robin Fabb. I didn't know that Frank Farrion like dropped a real Milli Vanilli album like right after that and did the same thing.

[00:30:11] - [Sir Daniel]
Two new people.

[00:30:12] - [Jay Ray]
With two new people. He had he had the the people who sang, and then these two new people out front who ain't had nothing to do. They ain't saying nothing. They just in the group.

[00:30:24] - [Sir Daniel]
Lip syncing. Again, all he cared about was that, oh, they're black.

[00:30:30] - [Jay Ray]
They're black.

[00:30:31] - [Sir Daniel]
They look good. Yep. And they can really move, which is Hey, brother.

[00:30:35] - [Jay Ray]
They can really move.

[00:30:37] - [Sir Daniel]
You know, which is just debasing us to the again, to natural physical attributes, which has been happening since, you know, we got the into onto the ships and across the Transatlantic because of physical attributes. Always, always just being reduced to just physical prowess, physical attributes, physical gifts. Mhmm. We continue to be used for our gifts in this country.

[00:31:07] - [Speaker 2]
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[00:31:50] - [Sir Daniel]
Sometimes I play records. I spin records, and I think about these the voices behind some of these records. And I'm just like, god. What kind of sacrifice did you do for us give for us to to play these records, to to dance to them, to to play them at our barbecues, to play them at graduations? That's why I I hold artists and music to such high regard because I it's covered in blood.

[00:32:22] - [Sir Daniel]
It was made with blood. And I can't disrespect that's why I get so disgusted when other black black young people disregard and throw away artists from a different era just because they're from a different era and they feel that they're irrelevant when in fact the road that you're walking on has been paved with their blood. You know? So so, yeah, I it it lends you know, that Robin Fabb moment really lends to this discussion. You know?

[00:32:58] - [Sir Daniel]
And earlier, we were just talking about the whole sex and sex sex aspect of exploitative the sexually exploitive nature of the industry. You know, we've seen it. You know, it's not just in pop music. It's not just, you know, r and b. It's happened in hip hop.

[00:33:21] - [Sir Daniel]
Mhmm. You know? I remember when the Roxanne Roxanne movie came out.

[00:33:26] - [Jay Ray]
Mhmm.

[00:33:26] - [Sir Daniel]
You know, she had a a record on the on the air, on the radio, but was still homeless and, you know, was told that, hey. If you need to stay here, you gotta pay to play. So imagine you're 15 years old. You're trying to you know, you're you're out here trying to make it in this business, but you don't have any place to stay because you've got put out from the house, and you're dealing with that. You're dealing with pay to play.

[00:33:56] - [Sir Daniel]
You're dealing with having to have survival sex in order to just live, to to to have your basic needs met. And then you have it on that level, and then you get to another level like a Cassie and a Diddy situation where it's like, okay. I'm gonna sign you to a 10 record deal.

[00:34:18] - [Jay Ray]
10

[00:34:21] - [Sir Daniel]
records. Deal. But I'm going to I don't know. It it is this was definitely a really a personal thing.

[00:34:28] - [Jay Ray]
Oh, yeah.

[00:34:29] - [Sir Daniel]
The things that he he was he's alleged to have done to her was really stuff that was done on a personal level, also making sure that she couldn't prosper in any other Nope. Forms of entertainment, making sure that he kept a thumb on her for the rest of her life.

[00:34:45] - [Jay Ray]
Yeah. So I think the thing that is really important is what you're saying, because here's the thing we need to remember about this Cassie situation. Her career died after she started he literally killed that woman's music career.

[00:35:07] - [Sir Daniel]
Yeah.

[00:35:08] - [Jay Ray]
But she was signed to a 10 album deal, so even if they stopped dating, she would've still had to deliver y'all nine I think, and ended up because I think it was like a second one somewhere. So eight, eight other albums. If you do an album every two years, that's sixteen years.

[00:35:31] - [Sir Daniel]
And and knowing that all the while knowing that her presence in the industry as each year goes by is being eclipsed by newer and younger artists coming out every single year. You've got, you know, these titans of the industry that are are are rising up to their superpowers. So where does a Cassie fit? Where does a Danny Cain fit, you know, in this whole landscape of music? And when you keep when you the person that could actually benefit from their pros their prosperity is keeping them down, basically.

[00:36:16] - [Sir Daniel]
Because for whatever reasons, we don't know, but, like, separating them from, you know, other producers and people that can help them and curate their sound. Because quite honestly, we fell in love with the Cassie sound because of her relationship with Ryan Leslie, whose laptop mysteriously disappeared, by the way, guys.

[00:36:34] - [Jay Ray]
Baby, we never we ain't never found Ryan Leslie's music.

[00:36:38] - [Sir Daniel]
Music on that laptop. But just to you know, there's just so many instances. Again, you spoke of Drew Dixon at the top Mhmm. And how her her documentary really was the lead domino in this effect of, you know, women in the music industry, specifically black music industry speaking up about the atrocities that they were facing at the hands of the men, the brothers who are supposed to be who are supposed to be looking out for them in this industry and, in fact, using their power and let's talk about that, Jay Raider. Using their perceived power to control them, basically.

[00:37:26] - [Sir Daniel]
Mhmm. And we see that happen outside of the music industry. Right? We see, you know, people in this society, let's take black men for instance Mhmm. You know, try to exert some power in this white supremacist structure.

[00:37:45] - [Sir Daniel]
And what do you do when you're trying to build power to execute power, you pick on somebody that you feel is less than you. So you pick on you pick on women because they're the closest to you. Right? You pick on the people that have the most proximity to you. So you pick on your your wife, your girlfriend, your sister.

[00:38:06] - [Sir Daniel]
You pick on them, and you do whatever to them and talk about them. You pick on the gay people Mhmm. Because they're they're also in close proximity to you in the in the community, specifically in the black community. So you pick on them, and you will search your dominance in the way that you feel, puts you ahead, puts you closest to power, the white supremacy power structure that has been built within this country. So I think that's what translated translates into the industry.

[00:38:37] - [Sir Daniel]
Then, of course, you know, you got some of them that are just naturally dickheads, you know, that are, you know, creeps, naturally have those kind of inclinations already. And so you give you mix that with money, some power, some powder, and and you got a a wicked storm happening to a lot of women in the music industry.

[00:39:00] - [Jay Ray]
Sir sir Daniel, I think that's the archetype. Like, I think and I've noted I'm gonna use a I statement. I've noticed this years ago. Mhmm. Just watching how people move, there is an archetype, and I think all of those things that you described, I all of those things you described, I actually truly believe that many of these folks are just like not good folks.

[00:39:28] - [Jay Ray]
Like just because to do some of the things, to do any of the things that when we're talking about these these men specifically, I don't know what kind of human being does things that they're accused of. I just don't know. So I think it's just some of these folks that just not good folks. You know what I'm saying? And Yeah.

[00:39:57] - [Jay Ray]
They're in an industry that doesn't have some of the same checks and balances.

[00:40:04] - [Sir Daniel]
A lot

[00:40:04] - [Jay Ray]
more ability to make a lot more money, and that money gets you to a certain level of power, a certain level of power because you ain't Mhmm. Getting to the top of the pyramid. Right?

[00:40:15] - [Sir Daniel]
But you are rewarded.

[00:40:17] - [Jay Ray]
But you are rewarded. You are rewarded though. So enough that you are able to excel. So, yeah, I think what we are also learning is just that some of these folks is like, yo, I don't know what kind of human being you have to be to do what some of the stuff you're accused of doing is. That's crazy.

[00:40:39] - [Sir Daniel]
It's crazy. It's ridiculous. But I think yeah. Yeah. To your point, we can see the handful of people that didn't make it or don't make it because they're we had that that nice guy discussion.

[00:40:52] - [Sir Daniel]
Right?

[00:40:52] - [Jay Ray]
Mhmm.

[00:40:53] - [Sir Daniel]
You know, for lack of a better example, let's use Ruben Stutter. Yep. Ruben Stutter was supposed to be America's next I next idol, American Idol, and he came and he went. You know, wonderful singer was supposed to be set up to be the next Luther Vandross and all that other stuff, but he did not possess a certain swagger and maybe even a certain nastiness to him, you know, like an Aaron Hall whose name has been coming up a lot recently as well. You know?

[00:41:29] - [Jay Ray]
I know.

[00:41:29] - [Sir Daniel]
He didn't possess that kind of stereotype that America loves of a black man that relies solely on his his power, which is primarily derived from his sexuality and his prowess and his ability to dominate in those types of things. So it's just really it's it's it's it's really kinda sad that maybe you can't succeed in the industry unless you're a little bit of you have a little smidgen of asshole in you. You know, you gotta be we we tend to and we tend to cheerlead the asshole. We tend to like those kind of people. They might be you know, we're always like, yeah.

[00:42:14] - [Sir Daniel]
You know, that that's a wild boy. He wild, but, you know, I rock with him. I fuck with him. I like that music, but he he a wild boy. But, you know, that's kinda because you kinda wish you you're living vicariously through him is what it is.

[00:42:28] - [Jay Ray]
You know what? That you are absolutely right. That's another mic drop moment because that's true. And I think that yeah. Folks idolize and admire we gotta rework this.

[00:42:45] - [Jay Ray]
We gotta change the way that we we gotta change the way that we hold people up because they achieve a certain level of success and money in this white power structure. Because I'm telling y'all, something in that milk don't be clean all the time. You know what I'm saying? And I'm not saying that you wanting to get your bag is not okay. I'm not saying that.

[00:43:14] - [Jay Ray]
Get your bag because I'm a get mine. DJ Sardin, you're get his bag too. But what I am also saying is that we can see that within the the system, there's a certain person that gets let in the door. Right?

[00:43:33] - [Sir Daniel]
Yeah.

[00:43:35] - [Jay Ray]
And with the way them folks move, there's an expectation for how you move too. And we have to, for black folks, we have to rewrite what all of that means for us. And and to some of the and to all of these cases actually that we're talking about, there's so much harm that has been done. This is like a lot of harm. And I'm I'm I'm not one of those mass incarceration, like throw everybody in jail sorts of dudes.

[00:44:10] - [Jay Ray]
I also will admit, I don't know what the restorative justice for the harm that some of these folks have experienced. I don't know what the answer is, but what I but what I know is it's bad. It's bad Yeah. And it needs to be, we have to, as a community, reckon with the fact that these folks have been allowed to, in most cases, kind of prosper and get all get to this level of, like, power and influence because I think it's a problem.

[00:44:48] - [Sir Daniel]
It's a big problem. And I think, you know, before you all get started, Diddy was not about to buy NBC. You know, that's that's not that's not

[00:44:58] - [Jay Ray]
But he was about to buy BET. Remember that was a thing? Wait. It was like Diddy is It was Tyler It was Diddy, and it was I feel like oh, and I feel like Byron Allen was in there too.

[00:45:09] - [Sir Daniel]
I feel like Definitely Byron Allen. But the difference is so here's what we can what we can do, I believe, is we can lift the names of those or at least lift the sisters up and the and the brothers that have been victimized because too far too many people have been victimized in this industry, and they become punchlines.

[00:45:34] - [Jay Ray]
Yeah.

[00:45:34] - [Sir Daniel]
But think about I I'm thinking about, like, to this day, Patti LaBelle is a survivor. Yes. She's a true survivor of this industry, and and look how beloved she is. Yep. But she has been very clear that she was a victim of sexual assault very early Yep.

[00:45:51] - [Sir Daniel]
In her in her in her quest to to stardom by another musician. Yep. You know, it happens quite a bit. Again, Drew Dixon in her documentary, Sherry Sher from the Mercedes ladies, very early in the in the hip hop game on the verge of becoming a great, the first probably the first female hip hop group to get signed to a major record label, but that was derailed because of a failed because of a sexual assault incident that's documented in the in the documentary as well. Then you there's countless women that have probably have gone through that, have have had some type of assault, you know, and and countless brothers too who probably just don't wanna be named at this point.

[00:46:38] - [Jay Ray]
That's a really important point too because I do think we need to, as a community, make space for black men and boys to tell to be able to talk about the abuse that they experience and not judge them for it. Because there are probably countless men and boys that we have not heard from because they're afraid for whatever reason.

[00:47:13] - [Sir Daniel]
It's so funny you said that. I'm sorry. I just had to say this.

[00:47:16] - [Jay Ray]
Uh-huh.

[00:47:17] - [Sir Daniel]
On that to that same point, fifty Cent has been, in his own way, making this a punchline and bringing up his encounters with Diddy about Diddy take wanting to take him shopping and using that as a punch line now as saying that in his own way kinda saying, oh, that that shit would have never happened with me because I'm a real man. And that would have never gone down with me because I'm a real man. But what he's saying and I don't know I don't even think he realizes it. When he says things like that and he makes light of the situation and jokes about, oh, you need to go and take somebody else shopping. That's not gonna happen to me.

[00:48:02] - [Sir Daniel]
And it's kinda making whoever that young man is that's in the studio right now and being manipulated in whatever way, not be able not feel comfortable to speak up to J Ray's exact point. And because nobody people isn't making space for our young men, for our boys to speak up if they're being mistreated and mishandled, especially in the entertainment industry?

[00:48:28] - [Jay Ray]
Sir Daniel, I think and this is this is hard y'all because there's gonna be a whole lot of people that we love and would be like probably sitting here thinking like,

[00:48:39] - [Sir Daniel]
no. Yeah.

[00:48:42] - [Jay Ray]
I think the domino has already it's already way down the way and we have a lot more illuminating that will happen over the next few years. Mark, I think said way back in the beginning in the chat that the whole decade is gonna be trash. I think we're gonna be

[00:49:02] - [Sir Daniel]
like It's gonna it's gonna be pretty awful. But to like J Ray was saying, I think this is also an opportunity for for all of us to be aware. Yes. You know, grooming grooming is a real thing.

[00:49:18] - [Jay Ray]
Yes.

[00:49:18] - [Sir Daniel]
If you don't know what grooming is, grooming is is somebody in power targeting, pinpointing somebody who is vulnerable that could that could easily be manipulated to do whatever they want, easily manipulated through the means of financial insecurity, food insecurity, homelessness, whatever it takes. Or not even those bad things, maybe just somebody who wants to be in the in crowd and wants to be accepted. There's a lot of there's a lot of grooming that takes place. So I think as a community, we have to be aware of what grooming looks like Mhmm. And and the ways that it could be perpetrated right in under our noses.

[00:50:09] - [Jay Ray]
Mhmm.

[00:50:10] - [Sir Daniel]
And also wanting to make sure that we show love to all our kids Yeah. And give them and make sure that not only are we providing for them, you know, food, clothing, and shelter, but also making them feel like they're enough for who they are and that their bodies don't have to be placed on the auction block. And it's so hard because we love what we do as musicians and artists that we wanna keep that part of it going, but we really have to extract that nasty little bug, that nasty little infestation that has been plaguing us for decades, for centuries now in this industry that of music and entertainment on a whole. So I think this has been a really good episode, J Ray, and I think this is something that hopefully will spark conversation. You know, magazines, television shows, holler at us.

[00:51:10] - [Sir Daniel]
You know, you want some of this cue points juice to be on your show. All you gotta do is holler at the folks at cue points dot com, and we will be there. And, J Ray, how else can they make sure they stay in contact with us?

[00:51:22] - [Jay Ray]
Listen. Thank you all so much. Yes. Oh.

[00:51:26] - [Sir Daniel]
Yeah. Somebody brought up gospel music. You know what? Gospel music is a whole another animal, and it's probably just as it's probably not just as bad, but maybe even worser. I can say we're

[00:51:41] - [Jay Ray]
goodness. We would get drag oh, they would be dragging us. Oh my god. Okay. But we're not going okay.

[00:51:48] - [Jay Ray]
Yes. Yes to that. But okay. Staying up with cue points. So what so gospel came up in the chat.

[00:51:57] - [Jay Ray]
For those of you that are listening, you might be like, what happened? Gospel came up in the chat y'all and lots to discuss there. But Lots

[00:52:06] - [Sir Daniel]
of nasty work in there too.

[00:52:08] - [Jay Ray]
Lots of nasty But so y'all are doing the right thing. Y'all are here with us, y'all are watching us, y'all are hanging out. That's great. Thank you for doing that. That's the most important thing.

[00:52:19] - [Jay Ray]
It's free. Subscribe.

[00:52:21] - [Sir Daniel]
So thank you for hanging with us. It's a very serious subject, but that's what we do here. We talk about the fun stuff, but we also talk about the difficult things. But what do I also always say, JRay, in this life, you have a choice. You can either pick up the needle or you could let the record play.

[00:52:36] - [Sir Daniel]
I am DJ Sir Daniel.

[00:52:38] - [Jay Ray]
I'm J Ray, y'all.

[00:52:40] - [Sir Daniel]
And this has been cue points podcast, dropping the needle on black music history. We will see you on the next go round. Peace.

[00:52:48] - [Jay Ray]
Peace on the next go round.