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Here's Why Joe Budden Painfully Broke Down In Tears During This 'State Of The Culture' Conversation...

"Like, how do we sleep at night?"

Joe Budden’s impassioned State of the Culture sentiments took an emotional turn on Monday’s segment on the subject of New York’s legendary hip-hop trio De La Soul and their inequitable streaming service plight beneath their record label home Tommy Boy Records.

Recently, the three rap veterans—Posdnuos, Trugoy and Maseo—revealed on Sway’s Universe that their intensely sought-after discography would soon be available on music streaming services after fans waited years for its release. But to the dismay of the group and the most avid De La Soul fans, they also revealed that Tommy Boy would receive a vast majority of the streaming profits at 90 percent, while the men would only collect a mere 10 percent. Tidal is reportedly the first to come forth against such a deal, declaring that they would not stream a single song from De La Soul’s catalog until justice is served to the 3 Feet High and Rising hip-hop icons. In response, Tommy Boy has now bottlenecked the entire streaming release until terms and conditions are met and agreed upon.

Joey happens to be one of those avid fans protesting against Tommy Boy’s iron-handed rule over the ordeal and was brought to tears while expressing the monetary and moral implications of such industry tyranny. 

  • According to them, Tommy Boy seemed to be the only one that would allow them to maintain unobstructed creative freedom under signage. As Remy Ma, Jinx and Scottie Beam expressed their sentiments, Joe became deeply saddened and angered at the sheer thought of the conversation. He begins crying as Scottie supports Jinx’s thoughts about Tommy Boy’s moral corruptness of it all.

  • ‘I’m teary because that’s just depressing to hear, but they sell us depression,’ Joe said…

    “When you think of all the stories being the same for this amount of years. Like,  when you look at De La telling you their battles from 30 years ago, and 2 Chainz album just came out saying we could just rap or play ball, it’s just sad.”

    Joe admits he was enraged while watching De La Soul’s interview with Sway after hearing how Tommy Boy were handing out “f**ked up” deals, but the group settled with them so as to not sacrifice their creative control. Even he can identify with such malpractice, he continued while taking into account his own deal with Def Jam. “For this to be happening to one of the greatest albums ever made,” he said, “At some point, it has to get away from the business side and onto a moral compass… like, how do we sleep at night?”

    In one of State of the Culture’s rarer happenings, the four co-hosts collectively agreed upon one point, which was Tommy Boy’s inarguable exploitation of the group.

  • Weigh in on the SOTC quartet's full sentiments for De La Soul's streaming situation below: 

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