JAY-Z did not stab Lance “Un” Rivera in 1999, the music executive and film director has finally admitted.
Rivera — a former friend and business partner of The Notorious B.I.G. who also signed and released albums from Cam’ron, Lil Kim and Charli Baltimore in the ’90s — opened up about the fateful incident in an interview with VladTV.
Hov was accused of stabbing Rivera in December ’99 at Q-Tip’s Amplified album release party at New York City’s since-closed Kit Kat Club.
The attack was believed to have stemmed from allegations that the Untertainment Records boss had leaked Jigga’s eagerly anticipated fourth LP Vol. 3… Life and Times of S. Carter weeks before its official release.
The Roc-A-Fella Records co-founder turned himself into police the following day and was facing up to 15 years in jail on charges of felony assault in the second degree if found guilty at trial.
After initially pleading not guilty and denying any wrongdoing, he later pleaded guilty to third-degree assault in October 2001 and was sentenced to three years’ probation.
According to Lance Rivera, however, JAY-Z was not responsible for stabbing him that night.
“What happened that night… I showed up to [the party] to support [Q-Tip]. Jay, a bunch of us is in there. I ended up getting surrounded by a bunch of people. It was probably 10 knives that I knew of, and I ended up getting stabbed at the Kit Kat Club,” he told DJ Vlad.
When asked point blank if Jay was the one who stabbed him, he replied with a laugh: “No. JAY-Z was not the guy that actually stabbed me that night.”
Rivera explained that the Brooklyn rapper had confronted him in the nightclub and told him he “broke [his] heart,” before he was hit over the head with a champagne bottle and subsequently stabbed. He didn’t, however, reveal who he believes was behind the attack.
“Me and JAY-Z had a conversation right before I got hit in the head with a champagne bottle,” he recalled. “It was a brief conversation and I was looking at him like, ‘What are you talking about? You know you fucking the money up right now.’
“He just kept saying, ‘You broke my heart. You broke my heart.’ And I’m like, ‘What are you talking about? You’re buggin’ right now, bro. You getting ready to fuck up everything.'”
Rivera went on to express confusion at the narrative that JAY-Z stabbed him, calling the rap mogul a “nice guy,” and confirmed that he was stabbed once in the shoulder — not multiple times in the stomach and back, as was widely reported.
The former label owner also brought up Nas’ claim on “Ether” that Hov took the fall for the attack (“And your man stabbed Un and made you take the blame”), questioning why few people at the time believed him.
“I don’t know where people got JAY-Z stabbed me from because if anybody knows JAY-Z, JAY-Z’s a nice guy,” Un said. “He’s an artist, he’s a poet, he’s gifted and it’s never been his history. If JAY-Z had stabbed me, y’all wouldn’t have got The Black Album because through my whole history, I’m an eye-for-an-eye type of guy.
“The reality to it is Nas — and I don’t know why didn’t nobody believe him — on ‘Ether’ he talked about the incident. He let people know like, ‘Yo, your man stabbed Un and you took the blame for it.’
“Unfortunately, [JAY-Z] was caught up in the power struggle. It was all about the power to get rid of Dame Dash and take JAY-Z to the next level without Dame.”
JAY-Z addressed the incident himself in his 2010 book Decoded and while he didn’t admit to stabbing Lance Rivera, he did speak about “blacking out with anger” while confronting the music executive in the club that night.
“One night I went to Q-Tip’s solo album release party and at some point in the night, I ran into the guy everyone’s been telling me is behind the bootleg. So I approached him,” Jay wrote. “When I told him what I suspected, to my surprise, he got real loud with me right there in the middle of the club. It was strange.
“We separated and I went over to the bar. I was sitting there like, ‘No the fuck this n-gga did not…’ I was talking to people, but I was really talking to myself out loud, just in a state of shock. Before I even realized what I was doing, I headed back over to him, but this time I was blacking out with anger.”
He added: “The next thing I knew, all hell had broken loose in the club. That night the guy went straight to the police and I was indicted […] There was no reason to put my life on the line, and the lives of everyone who depends on me, because of a momentary loss of control […] I vowed to never allow myself to be in a situation like that again.”
Hov was on some Godfather II shit.
You broke my heart Fredo 💔
Un not keeping it one hundred about Hov with the “nice guy” talk but we see through him. Nas was right about the situation on Ether. Yeah, Jay mans stabbed him but Jay ordered the hit. Talking about nice, its almost ya’ll forgetting Jay shot his brother and had his man’s pepper spray R Kelly. That’s nice!
Yea çause you know him and why wouldn’t he take the case he’s going to get off his man’s gonna go to prison and lance said nothing about Jay ordering the hit I swear you dudes gossip more than females
Lance Riviera?? More like CHANCE MASCARA!!!!! Hahaha! I got ya!!!!!! HahahHaha!! Sheeeesh!! Gotta hand it to him tho, ain’t ya? You don’t have to be crazy to work here……but it sure does help!!!!! Hahahahaja!!! You guys know what I’m talking about! Anyway, no one cares about this old news when there’s a flock of new underground overground major minor label independent releases out this week from the likes of Grinch Minority, Fragrant Aunties, Big Grandma, Tender Bonanza, Shaka Bagpipe, Lil $paghetti, Kweef Championz, Dank Hummus, Morbid Darlin’ Tendertrunks, Hosiah muffin-gawd, Janet Crumpets, Lean Jesus Stank-Commode, Feral Madonna, Princess Mozarella, Dusty Boobs, Bouquet of Turds, Tobacco Helen and BeefSheet O’Judas. Cannot wait to bump these tunes in my Satsuma Castanet XR4 whilst I’m on fleek at the club tonight. Downtown Quonochontaug is where it’s at, you know dat FOR REAL!!! Park Hill reprazent. Shout out Big Papa X and Tania – Tanz it’s been too long! I want to give a shout-out to Louisiana’s Governor Kathleen Babineaux Blanco for bringing to light the problem of Louisiana’s coastal erosion – god bless you KBB! Big shout-out to my boy Lawson for throwing me such a super fly Easter party and thanks for the Cleveland Hot Pocket, brah.
Ain’t no way anybody upvoted that autistic gibberish you just typed, ain’t no damn way.
LOL, I read that shit 3x, trying to figure out what 7 people saw that I didn’t see.
he went home without an aspirin…
Shaka Bagpipe and Beefsheet O’Judas tho.
@What – he posts this randomly all the time. Props for the creativity on Lean Jesus Stank-Commode
Lil $paghetti needs to be a thing.
Morbid Darlin’ Tendertrunks and Kweef Chalpionz also needs to be a thing!
So I’m going in. I feel Jay has a huge ego. For one, even though Nas spoke facts on the incident and nobody believed him, Jay tried to save face on Kill Jay Z: Crazy how life works / You got a knot in your chest, imagine how a knife hurts,/You stabbed Un over some records / Your excuse was he was talking too reckless!
I love Jay the emcee. But a lot of people chime in on his fragile ego like Funk Flex. And he will borrow from your style without giving homage (99 problems inspired by Ice T, flipping BIGs verses, Ye proclaiming how he told Jay he did a song with Cold Play and Jay did the same off on Big Brother: “ I told Jay I did a song with Cold Play/next thing I know he got a song with Cold Play…” And let’s not forget him doing all the remixes on hit songs in the 2000’s when they were hits, because, you know, one of those instances resulted in the legendary feud with Nas. Doing a joint with Damian Marley after Marley did a joint album with Nas is questionable. I do believe he is obsessed with Nas. J hence the time lines of dropping projects when Nas is doing so. One should never call Jay Z out. And him telling sun that he broke his heart was watching too much Godfather movies. I could argue about narcissism but I’ll stop right here…
People on Rivera’s label and everybody close to the situation said it was about Charlie Baltimore. We already know he likes to fuck behind his idols with the Carmen shit.
Jay took 99 problems from ugks pimp c not ice t
he went home without an aspirin…
he went home without an aspirin…
he went home without an aspirin…
he went home without an aspirin…
Your man stabbed Un and made you take the blame. You a dick rider, you love the attention. Nas told you this in 2001.