The founder of the legendary Terror Squad, Fat Joe, once claimed that a slew of artists have copied his music over the years. The rapper made this assertion in response to Boosie Badazz’s feud with Florida lyricist Rod Wave for supposedly copying him.
The Bronx native (real name Jose Cartagena) expressed that many have “jacked” his style without his permission over the years but insisted he would never take any of the MCs to court. He then proceeded to admit that although Boosie was right to take issue with Rod Wave, he shouldn’t have spoken about suing.
During an Instagram Live broadcast, Boosie (real name Torrence Hatch) spoke about Wave’s track ‘Long Journey’ and insisted that he had used lyrics from his own 2010 track of the same name. Ranting at his followers, Hatch screamed, “A lot of artists are sampling my s**t. I can’t even get a feature. People just don’t think I’m, you know, business-minded.”
He continued, “Can’t let you take my s**t, and I’m not getting nothing. I just want my split, you know, my cut. I ain’t mad. I love when they do that s**t! They wouldn’t do that to a white artist. They wouldn’t do that to another artist, just Boosie.”
Boosie threatened Wave with a lawsuit and, in response, Fat Joe sent out an announcement to all musicians, stating, “If you use somebody’s music and you sample it and you don’t clear it and you don’t give them no money, they can sue you. Me, personally, I have never sued nobody for that.”
Cartagena then read out a long list of songs that he believes ripped off his 2004 hit ‘Lean Back.’ The list included Young Dro’s ‘Shoulder Lean,’ Travis Porter’s ‘Make It Rain,’ and Dem Franchize Boyz’s ‘Lean Wit It, Rock Wit It’.
He revealed that taking his issues to the courts has never been a consideration for him, explaining, “My sh*t been jacked! If I went to court, I’d be like, ‘Exhibit A — that sh*t don’t look like ‘Lean Back’ to you?’ I could’ve sued people for sampling my sh*t 10, 20 times.”
However, it didn’t dissuade Boosie from bragging to his fans that he had several lawsuits ongoing, declaring, “They’ll have to make me part of their publishing and pop me off a little money. I got like five situations that my lawyer just got. I got like five situations where people stole my sh*t. Figure I’m too gangster to file a lawsuit. Rod Wave ain’t the only one! I done got paperwork on the way. A lot of people, bruh, it ain’t just Rod Wave.”
You can hear Fat Joe and Boosie Badazz putting their cases across in the video below.
