TDE Shoots Down Troy Ave Signing Rumors

Shortly after Troy Ave insinuated that he was once in talks to sign with TDE, Top Dawg says he has never spoken with the embattled New York rapper.

TDE CEO Anthony “Top Dawg” Tiffith cleared up any misinformation on Wednesday (Apr. 19). “4 the record… I’ve never had a convo with Troy ave or any 1 in his camp.. neither has KDot.. yesterdays story was fake news,” he tweeted. “There’s your answer…Now everybody kan stop calling and emailing me asking if it true.”

4 the record… I've never had a convo with Troy ave or any 1 in his camp.. neither has KDot.. yesterdays story was fake news… #TDE

— TOP DAWG #TDE (@dangerookipawaa) April 19, 2017

There's your answer…Now everybody kan stop calling and emailing me asking if it true…

— TOP DAWG #TDE (@dangerookipawaa) April 19, 2017

The rumor stems from a song on Troy Ave’s latest mixtape NuPac, in which he says that Kendrick Lamar indirectly reached out to him through a third party while he was locked up. “He said something to the effect of, ‘I see what Troy’s going through. I send my love. Tell him to hold his head.’ Whatever,” he said. “It was genuine so I appreciate that. That’s real shit.”

Later, Troy said he thought about it and told his then-manager Hovain to make a deal happen. “We going to go out west when I come home,” he told Hovain. “We gonna sign with TDE.”

Ave says he admired the label for many of its qualities. “I always liked what they was doing,” he said. “They kinda independent like us but way bigger ’cause they went and got with a major. They got shit that I like to see, like loyalty and unity.” Later, however, Troy said that the deal “just fell through.”

In the past, Troy Ave has labeled Kendrick as a “weirdo.” On his 2013 song “New York City,” the rapper said: “It was Big, Jay Z, now Troy Ave here after / But Kendrick Lamar’s just a weirdo rapper.”

Later, he elaborated on this rhyme during an interview with Hot 97. “It wasn’t a diss or nothing,” he said. “That’s like somebody being like, ‘Troy Ave is a dark-skinned rapper.’ Alright, it’s a fact. Weirdo is—Right now, with social media and the internet there’s a lot of different groups that are getting mixed and gelled into one. And it doesn’t go like that. Like with rock music you have different genres of rock. You have pop rock. You have classic rock. You have—help me out here—alternative rock. Now with rap music you can’t just fuse all types of rap. The basis of rap is from the streets. Every artist of any era in rap history, the biggest artist has always been from the streets. Kendrick was raised in it. It’s a difference between being from an area and being in the streets.”

In 2014, K-Dot responded to the comments. “Everybody entitled to they opinion,” he said. “I just continue to do what I do. But, you know, everybody feel they own aspects of it and how they look at different artists. But I just continue to do what I do. I don’t even know what the definition [of weirdo is]. I never met him. I never really focused on his music either.”