Fat Joe believes that major labels are a sham. On May 4th, the rapper appeared at the Wall Street Journal’s Future of Everything Festival, where he blasted the big label structure and called it a “Ponzi scheme.” He used to be signed to Atlantic Records, but he is now an independent artist.
During the festival, Fat Joe pondered on his previous experiences in the industry and how they brought him to where he is now. In truth, he has been self-sufficient for quite some time. He quit Atlantic before the publication of his 2006 album, Me, Myself & I, in the mid-2000s.
To begin with, Fat Joe expressed his skepticism towards the major label system, stating “I don’t believe in these people.” He then elaborated, saying “For one, I feel like the major label system is a Ponzi scheme and they do funny math.” This is not a rare opinion of the major label system, as many artists have called them out for their 360 deals and other shady business practices. Fat Joe continued, emphasizing the issue with their accounting methods: “Whenever you try to see something in life, they say numbers don’t lie. If you look at a chart and the numbers are so clear where you could say, ‘The price of this is this, the price of this is this…’” Joe continued, “And then when you look at [their] chart and they say 62.1%, 1.2… it’s funny math.”
Fat Joe Recalls Being Pitted Against T.I.
At the festival, Fat Joe continued to share more stories about his time with major labels. He even brought up how other artists had told him they had the same issues. “I was talking to [Jennifer Lopez] about it and you know, J. Lo is a megastar and she was like, ‘Man, you know these guys, they only give you this. You never recoup, you know,’” Joe said. Even a megastar like Jennifer Lopez can’t seem to escape the shady dealings of major labels.
At one point, a label executive even insulted Fat Joe to his face. The rapper was outsold by T.I., and the label took it as an opportunity to tell Joe that he was nothing in comparison. “[Atlantic’s president] tells me in my face, ‘Man, you’re a failure. You only sold a half-a-million. Look at this guy.’ And it was T.I. ‘He sold two million records. He’s the guy.’ Bro, they changed the six-story poster to T.I. so fast,” Joe said.
