Former princess of Roc-a-Fella records, Teairra Mari is speaking out on her sudden oust from the Dynasty. The singer, who was just 16-years-old when she signed with Def Jam and now has a new record deal at Fo' Reel Entertainment/Interscope dished details on her relationship with Jay-Z and how she feels about him now, the Def Jam employee who she doesn't want to put on blast and last but not least Rihanna, who threw her under bus when Rhianna told Atlanta Peach magazine that karma played a huge role in her success in the music industry and Teairra's struggles after she was forced to take a backseat to Teairra Mari during the beginning of career with Def Jam. Rihanna said, 'I was not always treated in the best manner but I always remained who I was and I was always kind in the toughest situations. I was just the little Caribbean girl. You have to be good to people. I could very easily say it's all karma...God has favor on me and has blessed me, and I cannot even thank Him enough." And although the two ladies began their careers at Roc-a-Fella at the same time...most people (such as myself) speculated it would Teairra whose career would have blow-up-tuated into what Rhianna's career looks like right now. Boy, were we wrong. Teairra's first album, Roc-A-Fella Presents: Teairra Mari (which spawned the hit single Make Her Feel Good, was released in 2005 and while the album reached the #5 position on the Billboard 200 albums chart and #2 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums charts, just one year later Teairra would stop production in the middle of recording her second album, Second Round after being released from her Roc-a-Fella/Def Jam contract. Mari is currently in the studio putting the finishing touches on her next as-yet-untitled album, slated for a late 2008/early 2009 release (listen to new her track titled No, No, No.), reports Billboard.com. The singer has been hired as the spokeswoman for Love's jeans line Jean Addicts, which bows officially in the fall. She also appears in the film Doorman, due later this year.
TEAIRRA ON RIHANNA'S COMMENTS & WHAT SHE'D SAY/DO TO HER IF SHE RAN INTO HER ON THE STREET: "I've never had anything but positive encounters with Rihanna, so when i read it, I was like, 'what the hell is she talking about?' I read it like a year ago and I was a little simpleminded at the time and I was ready to fight. But, now it's like it's nothing. It's a free country, so she can say what she wants to say, but I don't know what she's talking about, 'cause like I said, our encounters were always positive. We would see each other when we did things [for the label] together. We would speak and talk, and it was ll just really nice. There was never a problem. If there was an inside problem, then I never knew about it....I think she's growing as an artist. I think she's developed well. As a person, I mean I don't have anything negative to say, but those comments that she made about me, I don't agree with and I don't feel like she should have said that... [If I ran into her] I would say hi and ask her about the comments, because I want to know why she made them and from there it would depend on her response."TO FIND OUT HOW TEAIRRA FEELS ABOUT JAY-Z, HOW THE SINGER FIND OUT SHE WAS DROPPED FROM THE ROC & TO PEEP THROWBACK PHOTOS OF TEAIRRA WITH JAY-Z, BEYONCE, RIHANNA, NE-YO AND MORE. CLICK 'READ MORE AFTER THE JUMP!
TEAIRRA ON HER RELATIONSHIP WITH JAY-Z: "It was great. When I first got signed I was 16. Jay-Z treated me like I was his daughter almost. Everything was great. That's why when everything happened it was a little shocking, 'cause it was like a family thing. I haven't heard from him since I've been away from Roc-A-Fella. My opinion of him today is probably the same as it was. As far as Jay-Z as an artist, I have nothing negative to say about him, he's the greatest. But, like I said, he was calling me his daughter and all that, that's what I thought it was because I respect his word...I haven't really spoken to him so it could be something else."
TEAIRRA ON HER OUST FROM DEF JAM AND WHERE SHE WAS WHEN SHE FOUND OUT SHE'D BEEN DROPPED: "Being that young, I think it was kind of a raw deal. I felt like they knew all about my situation, like how my relationship was with my mother. When I went to Def Jam, that was like my new found family. I trusted a lot of the people there, so when they just threw me off the boat with no life vest, I was like, 'damn, how they gonna do that to a girl my age?' I was in Detroit at my grandmother's and I was getting out of the shower and I got a call from Jay Brown and he just told me, 'You know, we're not going to be continuing on with you. We love you, you're young...' and there was a bunch of label talk, then he was just like, 'We're gonna let you go.' I was like, 'okay, bye' and that was it. I was thrown back into the cold streets and I was on my own. I kept it to myself for about six months. Then news about it started coming out on the radio. I stopped doing music for a year. My relationship with my mother was done. It's better now, but at the time it was done. The label had come in, divide and conquered and left. They got involved in my family situation and put a wedge between me and my mother. They would go to her and talk about me and come to me talking about her, not Jay in particular, but others who were in the situation."TEAIRRA ON HER ISSUES WITH DEF JAM VP TRACEY WAPLES: "Well, me and Tracey had another personal problem. But I don't want to put anybody on blast. I will say we had another personal issue that I think had something to do with the situation (being dropped.) I'd rather not discuss that issue. Me and her once had a really good relationship. She was like a second mom to me and even though it's not the same now, I still have respect for her."
Who would've ever thought that Rihanna's career would blow up the way it did? Especially when you consider the fact that it was Jay-Z who personally crowned Teairra as the 'Princess of the Roc'leading folks to believe that that title alone would mean that she would be around for the long run and then some. Oh, well. Judging from the pics below, it looks like it was fun while it lasted.
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