Ashanti isn’t mincing her words about the predatory nature of the music industry revealing a producer she collaborated with gave her an unsavory ultimatum – shower sex or no songs without an $80,000 payment.
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The singer recalled the story to The Breakfast Club and said after making music together for about two weeks she desired to walk away with two tracks. She couldn’t have predicted the unnamed producer’s response, however.
“When it came time to put it on the album, he was like, ‘well, let’s take a shower together.’ I thought he was joking and then he was like, ‘Nah, I’m dead serious. Let’s go out or let’s take a shower together and I’ll give you the records. If not, I need 40 racks per record.’”
This wasn’t the first time Ashanti shared this salacious story.
The Grammy Award-winning pop star first told Access Live about what went down when #MeTooMovement revelations were consistently making headlines.
“Ummm..basically it was very weird,” the R&Beauty told Access Live. “We started out really cool. He’s very talented. And when it got down to the business of two records that I wanted, it kind of was like, okay, well, okay take a shower with me and let’s go out on a date and I’ll give you the music.
At that time, the songbird also revealed she thought the producer was joking and was “really taken aback” and naturally felt “disrespected,”
“It’s really creepy, it’s really, really sad.”
Black Twitter recently reacted to her traumatic tale and most users supported her.
“N**** told Ashanti let’s take a shower or 40k a song. N****!! You slime ball!!!
“Ashanti has really had to deal with some major creeps in the industry”
“That’s just f****** crazy @ashanti So sorry you had to experience that.”
Others however felt she shouldn’t speak about the incident if she refused to reveal the name of the perpetrator.
“I’m sorry but Why keep bringing this Incident up if you’re not going to say who it was”
Countless Twitter users came to her defense,
“Another thing that annoyed me about that tweet is them saying Ashanti should expose the predator so he can be avoided. What makes y’all think people stop associating with known predators? Especially in the industry?”
In 2020, Ashanti conversed with SiriusXM’s Conversations with Maria Menounos and shared the perpetrating producer issued an apology for his inappropriate actions after she asked friends and family to confront him.
“The way that apology came in, I actually got three records for free. And I got two of them mixed and mastered for free also.”
As previously reported, “Big Energy” rapper Latto also divulged the disgusting nature of men in music. The rapstress claimed an artist refused to clear a song for her album after she failed to respond to his DM. She was also berated on social media for refusing to reveal the identity of the individual.
We should allow sexual and verbal assault victims to tell their stories how they choose – the repercussions of name-dropping are irreparable for many.
Ashanti has had an exceptional career earning countless Billboard, American Music, and Soul Train Awards. Her name references the Ashanti empire of Ghana which means “woman of strength”, so it was no doubt that one peon couldn’t stop this pop princess from applying pressure.
