In the days leading up to the release of his long-delayed album Venom, Chamillionaire seems to have grown frustrated with his record label Universal, and what he claims are their misguided attempts to push him towards more mainstream music. In a video posted to UStream on Wednesday, Cham aired out his problems with the label, and its unwillingness to cooperate with his decision to use unreleased Pimp C verses on the new album.
“[Universal] wanted me to do a song with a girl from Gossip Girl. I never even watched Gossip Girl. I don’t wanna do no corny, cheesy–I don’t wanna do that. They would rather me do some stuff like that. They give me some ideas sometimes and it’s like I don’t want to do that, I want to be authentic. Because that’s what got me where I’m at. And they’re like, ‘Well Ridin’Dirty ended up being a big pop record.’ [And I say], no, it wasn’t a pop record, it was actually a street record. It was something that just infiltrated pop culture…You don’t sit there and try to force #1 records, you just make authentic music.”
Chamillionaire claimed that Universal insists on his cutting the album down to ten tracks (including the removal of the Pimp C collaboration) despite his opposition.
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“I’m telling [Universal] ‘Hey, name one person who put out a 10-song album and was successful.’ And they’re saying, ‘Justin Beiber did it and Sade and Maxwell,’ and I’m like, ‘Man, name one rapper.’ People want content. You’re talking to a guy who put out a triple-disc mixtape. People want content, they don’t want no 10 songs…I don’t want to get too deep into that but it’s a lot of that nonsense. In this industry I refuse to fake it. I refuse to tell ya’ll that everything is so gravy. You get in this industry and you’re going to have to deal with a lot of nonsense like that. You’re going to have to deal with people who are not attached to music at all telling you how to make the song.”
Despite his disillusion with Universal, Cham promised that Venom would soon release. He also explained that he is so emotional about the issue because of others who have rested their hopes on him.
“There are people who depend on me. And I don’t want to do anything I think is going to get us in trouble or get us in the red. Universal would probably love for me to owe them money and be in the hole [but] I don’t want to owe them money. I want to make sure that we got a good plan. I want to make sure that the music is right.”
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Venom is scheduled to drop on June 22.
