Jobie

It might be a trend to rewrite and discredit our Black legends, especially the women. Black Women. Rage Bait = Engagement. But, the facts about Ashanti are this. She had a very successful three platinum album run in THREE years. Two of those albums went #1. One broke records. She’s still in the Guinness Book Of World Records for highest debut album sales for a female artist [Over 500K her first week]. The only reason her third album had a short lived run is because her label had a serious legal issue going on which halted everyone’s promo and money from Ashanti to Lloyd to Ja Rule. She spent her own money finishing the album’s rollout. She then got into very successful movies and Broadway plays & musicals. Nobody ever considered her Aaliyah’s replacement. Ashanti was signed three times before Aaliyah passed and was releasing music before Aaliyah passed. Ashanti was modeled in the image of Mary J. Blige. Especially sonically. She was discovered singing MJB. Murder Inc’s documentary will tell you this. Or two fucking ears. Her music career hitting a snag had nothing to do with Rihanna, Ciara, nor Beyonce. She and Beyonce were #1 the same year, both killing it. Unfortunately, 4 years passed before we got another Ashanti record and the game had changed. A Grammy, 20 million records later, three platinum albums & 19 Hot 100 entries later - Mrs. Haynes has had a great career due to her and her mother’s hard work. Let’s celebrate Black women in Pop, R&B, etc without dismissing & diminishing another. There’s room for plenty to win.