Mary J. Blige is not sugarcoating the way she used to behave. 

Nearly 40 years into a career that made her one of the most beloved voices in R&B, the singer looked back on her early years with honesty and called her younger self a “monster.” On Scott Evans’ “House Guest” show, Blige said, “I used to be a monster. 1994 Mary was horrible. Go Google it. You’ll see it. It was terrible, man.” 

Blige said part of that behavior showed up in how she treated people around her, including reporters. She admitted to “cursing out” journalists who kept asking the same questions and said that, back then, she was not always easy to deal with. “That's rude and ungrateful. I grew up,” Blige said. Her perspective is different now. At 55, she said she better understands that people wanting to talk to her is a blessing, not a burden. 

The singer also said she eventually made a point to apologize to everyone she had mistreated. Before releasing her “No More Drama” album, she asked her team to line up “every person I was ever disrespectful to. And I apologized to every last one of those people.”

“It was humbling, but it wasn’t something I was afraid of. I knew in my spirit that I had to do it because I was awful.” Blige said those apologies “cleared my conscience” and helped open new doors in her career. 

Scott’s show has become a destination where Black celebrities come and let their hair down. Shortly after Blige’s admission of her “monster” era, the mic she was wearing detached and rolled down her chest, causing her to scream, jump up, and run. She thought it was a bug. Scott got up and ran laughing too, and then they burst into side-splitting laughter together. “Please keep that. That was good,” Blige laughed. The funny moment made for an exclamation point on the vulnerability she’d shared on the show.

Honesty has always been part of Blige’s appeal. She has built a legacy on singing through pain, growth, and self-discovery, and this latest confession fits right into that very legacy.