During that time, Jadakiss has been working on an LP he says would be titled Kiss My Ass. Interscope released a Styles single featuring Akon called "Can You Believe It," which is actually one of the hottest records in New York right now. However, Styles' LP Time Is Money still has no release date. The album has been finished for two years and has been pushed back incessantly. Styles said that Interscope recently told him it wanted to finally put the album out this month, but a number of factors caused him to dissuade the company to do so. He explains that the record would have come out without the proper setup, and would have hit shelves around the same time as Sheek's After Taxes, which has been long advertised as dropping November 8.
"They put our backs against the walls," Jada vented on Monday (November 7). "Sh-- ain't right. It ain't panning out."
Styles put part of the blame for his record's delay on 50 Cent's influence at Interscope. 50 has nicknamed himself "Curtis 'Interscope' Jackson" and on records he's warned Jadakiss that he would indeed push Styles' album back. Recently on New York radio, 50 initially denied having anything to do with Styles' LP delay, then hinted that he may indeed have had a hand in its scheduling.
"On the radio he said the building leans when he leans," Styles detailed. "What is that telling me? I don't wanna go to jail. And I don't wanna step on none of these rich people's toes. I don't wanna argue with none of these people and I don't wanna continue to frustrate myself wondering when my album is gonna come out. I'm at a point in my life when I can't be waiting two years for them to drop my album. Why be a slave?"
In the past couple of weeks, 50 has divulged a plan to put aside his feud with the LOX and help Jada make his next album (see "50 Cent Open To Doing Business With Jadakiss, Urges Calm Over 'Murda' Mase"). Needless to say, Kiss said he would never work with 50 Cent.
"It'll be over for hip-hop," Styles said of what would happen if Jada worked with G-Unit. Styles also elaborated that he heard the Ruff Ryders were trying to iron out a deal to put the next Kiss album out with G-Unit, much like how G-Unit and Aftermath released the Game's The Documentary earlier this year.
"The sh--'s crazy. It makes you go, 'This sh-- is crazy,' " Styles said about learning of Dee and Waah's talks with 50. "I don't understand what the f--- is going on. We keep speaking and speaking and it seems like nothing is getting nowhere. The sh-- is worse now. They trying to get Jada on G-Unit."
The final factor that is causing Styles and Kiss to step away from the mic is the fact that Diddy still owns a significant amount of their music publishing — the LOX used to be signed to Bad Boy — and they've been unable to sit down and renegotiate with him.
"I don't have no beef with him, but I'm not feeling him," Styles said of Diddy. "He don't want to come off none of that publishing. That's securing your future. That's what's gonna come in later down the line. The direction things are going now, it's going downhill. It's like we almost blackballed and we been fighting through the blackball. He has all this money, he has Justin's , Sean John, he throws million-dollar parties but we can't get a piece of our publishing back?"
For LOX fans, there are a couple of bright spots in this whole mess. For one, no rapper retires forever — we've seen that time and time again. And the LOX could always end up at another label home. They've all confirmed that Jay-Z was interested in bringing them to Def Jam, but Styles says Interscope hasn't really entertained the offer as of yet.
Last week, Ruff Ryders refused to comment on its dealings with Jadakiss and Interscope. On Monday, a rep for Interscope had no comment at press time.
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