R&B singer Ari Lennox has had a tough week on social media.
Ari Lennox says she wants out of J Cole record label
The Pressure songstress has sure been feeling it lately. Her brush with customs officials at an airport in Amsterdam in late November 2021 was only the tip of the iceberg.
Following a virtual interview with South African podcaster ‘MacG‘, Lennox has had to deal with internet trolls all weekend.
The interview was widely condemned for MacG’s abrasive and highly sexualised questions and Lennox, a woman with every right to defend herself from predatory behaviour exerted on her by a man, has been cleaning up the PR nightmare all by herself.
This seems to have affected the singer who, on Sunday, tweeted that she wants to be dropped from Dreamville Records, a music label co-founded by rapper J. Cole.
I want to be dropped from the labels. I’m done and tired.
— Ari Lennox (@AriLennox) January 23, 2022
Lennox went on to double down on her admission when she replied to a heckler, claiming the interview mishap was the icing on the cake, suggesting she has been unhappy at Cole’s label for a while.
Shut up! The interview was the icing on the cake. I want to be free. https://t.co/B8t7ck8WR4
— Ari Lennox (@AriLennox) January 23, 2022
No word has come from Dreamville, as yet, on what the implications of Lennox’s candid tweets are. The songstress was, after all, propelled too stardom by Cole’s record label after years of life in a rut, dealing with scummy music producers and shoddy music businesses.
Speaking as a guest on Essence‘s Yes, Girl podcast, Lennox recalled how she almost skipped out on a meeting with J. Cole over her job at Public Storage, where she earned $10 (est. R151) per hour.
“Yeah, I felt like no. I’m not doing this. I’m not getting on this plane. I was scared of planes and then also just got this job. It was $10 an hour. To me, that was way more important than meeting J. Cole,” she said.
Of course, a platinum debut album later, she would have been glad to follow her gut. But, years later, as a budding musician with one of the most anticipated sophomore R&B albums, it seems Lennox is ready to move on from her record label.