S. Samuel
Mobb Deep's Prodigy recently reflected on his and Havoc's 2006 G-Unit Records debut, Blood Money, and why it was so poorly received by diehard fans.
Talking to radio hosts DJ Green Lantern and Boss Lady, Capital P said the presence of too many G-Unit artists may have hurt their only release under 50 Cent‘s label.
“That G-Unit album that we did, Blood Money, yeah, I think the only problem with that album was, we was having so much fun just doing songs with our people, they was on too many songs I think. I think 50 [Cent] was on too many songs, then we had [Lloyd] Banks, [Tony] Yayo and [Young] Buck. You know what I mean? It was a little bit oversaturated with the G-Unit artists. … When I was out, we was touring the album, I was hearing all this feedback from the fans like, ‘Oh, this album is too G-Unit, Mobb Deep sold out.'” (Hip Hop Nation)
Prior to signing a distribution deal with Sony RED last summer, Prodigy hinted at possibly inking back with G-Unit.
“You can go get your money, elsewhere. And when that happened I was always talking to 50 [Cent] the whole time while I was locked up, and I basically asked him ‘How are we going to proceed? How are we going to move forward when I get back?’ And he was telling me he was interested in negotiating a new deal, with the new situation he’s got, and I was like, ‘Alright, cool.’ Came back home, and we’re still talking about it, throwing ideas around now about how we want to do it, but as of right now we’re free agents.” (Complex)
In March, Hav confirmed speculation claiming Mobb Deep were off G-Unit.
“An album is definitely in the sights,” he said. Although the disc’s home is uncertain as of know. Havoc said, while they are still cool with 50 Cent, the group is no longer on G-Unit Records. “It was a problem for Interscope, where I guess they felt that we didn’t sell enough records for them at that time,” he explained. “So they let us go off the roster and we was like, the stipulations in contracts was real technical so after that I think the G-Unit contracts just expired. [But] we [won’t] stay homeless for long,” the free agent added. (XXL Mag)
In late 2009, 50 Cent provided a G-Unit Records roster update and explained why Mobb Deep were no longer on the label.
“As far as the rest of the roster, of course the original G-Unit as a group are gonna stay together,” Fif promised in an interview. “That’s myself, Tony Yayo and Lloyd Banks and on the actual label, G-Unit Records as a roster, I let Prodigy and Havoc go off the label because P had to get extra money before he went into jail. And Havoc just had idle time while P was gone because he didn’t work as often as P does. M.O.P. was kinda just waiting for me to do it for them…Hot Rod and Spider Loc are still technically signed to G-Unit Records…[Young] Buck is still signed to G-Unit Records, hopefully he can come up with a record. If he can come up with a song, we can get my money back, you know what I’m saying? I hope he can come up with something right quick. I’m looking forward to that check at least. They gotta pay me not to put the [G-Unit] logo on it.” (This Is 50)
Mobb Deep’s run on G-Unit lasted from summer 2005 to 2009. In 2006, Mobb Deep released Blood Money which reportedly sold under 500,000 copies to date. Last year, 50 Cent signed a distribution for his G-Unit Records through EMI Music.
Check out Prodigy’s interview below:
