After making headlines for his negative reaction to the recent Aaliyah Lifetime movie, Timbaland stopped by The Breakfast Club and expanded on his criticisms before singing the praises of his new artist from Chicago, Tink.
When asked about the portrayal of Aaliyah and R. Kelly in this past weekend’s Lifetime movie, Timbaland hinted that the producers should have reached out to the family first.
“You just tampering,” he said. “You gotta ask permission. And her father’s dead. Uncle Mike passed away, rest in peace. That was my guy. He was always looked at me as a son. Told me everything that was going on. You just don’t put certain things out without consulting the mother. You just don’t do that.”
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Still, Timb did admit that the publicity from the movie has raised awareness about Aaliyah and her music.
“I feel like we don’t talk about great music enough,” he said. “I felt like the good thing about that movie, it brought up awareness of what we have done and a feeling that we don’t have today. I feel like if you go back and listen to Aaliyah’s music it makes you realize what today’s music is.”
Explaining his own sparse release schedule and reluctance to work heavily with individual artists as he did with Aaliyah, Ginuwine, and more, Timbaland said, “I feel like you gotta protect your legacy.”
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“When I did all my hit records, every one was different,” he added. “Every one might have hit you by surprise because it wasn’t like the last one. But you got to love Timbaland because of that. Maybe you didn’t like that song when it came out, but you grew to love it. Like, ‘He gave me a variety of different choices that I can [listen to] this morning. Maybe I don’t feel this way today, I might feel this way.’ I feel like people lock into one thing and ride it to the white meat. I look for greatness and special. Special don’t come around every day. It could take ten years. If it take ten years, I’m cool.”
Near the end of his appearance, Timbaland spoke about his current work with younger artists and Chicago rapper Tink in particular before playing a snippet of an unreleased version of Rick Ross’ recent Jay Z featuring single “Moving’ Bass” that features the 19-year old emcee.
“That’s a snippet,” he said afterwards. “That’s just a snippet.”
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“I mean, every artist has their own choice,” he said when asked why the snippet wasn’t released as the official version. “She’s a new artist I was focused on when we did that song back in the day. But it’s his prerogative, his choice. I love Ross, he could do what he wanna do. He might do it now. I don’t know.”
A radio rip of the snippet Timbaland played on air is available for streaming on HipHopDX here.
RELATED: Timbaland On Aaliyah Movie: “I Thought It Was A Joke”
