In a Breakfast Club interview that premiered December 1, hosts DJ Envy, Angela Yee, and Charlamagne Da God sat down with R&B singer Ashanti. The vocalist has been recently opening up about the misogyny and attempts at exploitation that she’s experienced while being a big name in the music industry since the early 2000s.
During her appearance, Ashanti opened up about a producer that she worked under who gave her an ultimatum. The unnamed producer allegedly told her to have shower sex with him or to pay $80,000 for two songs that they had been recently working on together.
She said, “We did two records together, and he was like, ‘Okay, I’m not gonna charge you, you know you, my homie.’”
“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 take a shower together, and I’ll give you the records. If not, I need 40 racks per record.’”
After the hosts expressed varying degrees of shock, she continued to explain that she had only been working with the producer for a few weeks up until that point.
Even then, she admitted that she still thought it was a joke.
“I said like, ‘You so crazy,’ but it turns out he was serious, so I had to make some phone calls, and it was handled.”
Despite the situation working out, everyone agreed that it should never have happened in the first place and that it was an all too real reality for a lot of women in the industry.
Angela Yee said, “All the things you’ve been addressing are important for women to hear, even for men.”
Ashanti agreed that it was sometimes hard: “Talking about it is challenging. You don’t wanna say too much. You don’t wanna say not enough,” But it was still important to have someone speaking up about it.
