Jermaine Dupri has cleared the air, once and for all, about what happened with Latto after she took home her win on the short-lived reality show, The Rap Game.
In an exclusive interview with HipHopDX, the super-producer spilled all the tea about what happened on the show, plus gave exclusive quips about Bow Wow, his upcoming Curren$y projects, and his artist Young Dylan.
“People keep saying, ‘Jermaine, you dropped the ball on [Latto],'” he said exclusively at the Lovers & Friends festival on May 6. “But what people don’t understand is, I put Latto’s record out. The deal was, if you win on The Rap Game, you get a single from Jermaine Dupri. So that single came out.”
He continued: “The problem was, was that Latto was 16 years old, and the outlets didn’t support it. And nobody was like speaking on it. Nobody talked about it. If you watched the TV show, you saw it. But people didn’t really start talking about Latto until she started making more vulgar records, dressing more sexual, and being more adult.”
Back in 2016, HipHopDX broke the news about Latto — who was, at the time, going by “Miss Mulatto” — winning the Lifetime reality competition.
The show pitted five pre-adult rappers; Miss Mulatto, Lil Niqo, Lil Poopy, Supa Peach and Young Lyric against one another for the opportunity to win a recording contract with Dupri’s So So Def imprint, and the 17-year-old Mulatto will now be the new face of the label.
The eight-episode first season saw the competitors battle it out in various challenges that highlighted mandatory attributes a rap star should possess such as battle rapping, live performances, and penning and recording a full song in-studio. Being around the Atlanta rap scene and having years worth of performances made Mulatto (real name Alyssa Michelle Stephens) not only the most consistent artist but the ideal choice to resume business once cameras stopped rolling.
But though she won the competition, Latto said at the time that she turned down the offer to be on Dupri’s So So Def Records because his contract wasn’t offering her enough money, according to an interview with Vlad TV back in 2016.
She did, however, invest the money she got from the show wisely, turning a clothing line into a success story.
She couldn’t legally suck and fvck her way to the top to get a deal yet. She had to wait until she was 18.
Yeah, because those music execs care.
Lmao
That sounds good. But if that was the case, wouldn’t their be way more successful female artist??? They’re are a lot of women willing to sleep they way to the top if that’s all it took. But speaking logically things are about energy, timing and opportunity. Her physical appeal catches eyes but that’s not enough you also need a label to spend money on you that creates a perfect storm to be somewhat successful. Some girls have the appeal but nobody spending money on them or they have the money and not the appeal. Sometimes a female artist that aren’t physically appealing to men can get hot with a smash single like Young MA and Gorilla. Majority of men attracted to the latto’s and Swaaeti’s types aren’t the ones that can push the buttons to help make them hot.
JD didn’t drop the ball he offered her a deal she declined. It worked out in her favor in the end. Now maybe JD could have made the deal more favorable but it’s always a risky investment when investing in new artist. But this also shows JD has that vision if he realized that Latto had star potential. They’ll most likely work with each other sometime. Big up to JD, he hasn’t received the credit he’s deserved for developing and pushing artist into stardom. Latto is doing her thing