Following Irv Gotti’s failed attempt to expose an alleged affair he had with Ashanti, the Happy singer is opening up about other wonky experiences with music producers.
On a recent episode of The Breakfast Club, the Long Island entertainer said that during a studio session with a producer, he gave her two options: she either had to sleep with him or pay $40,000 for each record he produced for her.
She recounted that prior to the studio session, the producer said he wouldn’t charge her for the records. “You know you my homie,” she said he said at the time.
When it came time to lay vocals on the tracks, he asked her to shower with him, she said
“I thought he was joking,” she said. “Then he was like, ‘Nah, I’m dead serious.'”
During a 2018 interview, Ashanti was asked about #MeToo in the music industry, to which she replied: “Unfortunately, these things definitely happen,” she said on SiriusXM’s Conversations with Maria Menounos. #MeToo was created to shine light on power imbalances, sexual abuse, harassment, rape culture and misogyny in the entertainment industry.
“I’ve come across a situation where there was a certain producer that, you know, he had his little crush or whatever, but it wasn’t anything new, you know?”
She continued: “Going into the session and recording, it was all good, and once I said ‘No,’ all of the sudden the track became $45,000.”
The Foolish singer added that she ultimately received both records for free plus one thanks to her “really cool, scary big brothers” she’s “blessed” to have.
“I had to call in the reinforcements.”
Fast forward to the Breakfast Club interview, she said that “at this point…20 years [in the industry] where we are in social media and what we’re doing to progressively grow in this industry…I feel like just for a woman, I had to come out and just say my piece.”
“At some point, you have just to speak up. And that’s what I did,” she concluded.
