In the rap game, friendships don’t always last.
Ice Cube left NWA, Game and 50 fell out after making hits together,
and now it looks like the same thing is happening to Meek Mill
and his mentor Rick Ross.
Meek and Ross have been solid for over a decade,
but now their relationship has gotten so bad
that their crews allegedly pulled guns on each other.
Here’s what happened.
Meek was born and raised in South Philly, an area known for crime..
His dad was killed when he was five years old,
so Meek’s mom Kathy raised him and his sister by herself.
Getting by as a single parent in the city wasn’t easy,
and Kathy had to steal food just to provide for her kids.
When Meek was growing up, his mom said he was shy and kept to himself,
but all that changed when he found out that one of his uncles was a Philly hip hop legend.
One of his dad’s brothers was a dude named Grandmaster Nell.
Nell helped kick off the music scene in the late 80s
and even had a massive influence on Will Smith and DJ Jazzy Jeff.
Music was in his blood,
and Meek started using it as a way to express himself.
He ain’t have any recording equipment or money for studio time,
so he battled dudes in the neighborhood to sharpen his skills.
Eventually he linked up with three of his homies from the area
and formed a group called The Bloodhoundz.
Meek knew that music could be his way out of the hood,
but before he could blow up, he was almost killed by the police..
One night he was walking to the corner store with a gun in his waistband
when three cops grabbed him and hauled him into his house.
One of his cousins told Rolling Stone: “It was like three cops -
two of them had his feet, and one of them had his arms.
They basically used his head as a battering ram.”
Once they had him inside, it turned into a horror movie.
The cops allegedly swung Meek’s head into a coffee table
and he started bleeding from his mouth and eyes.
Another cousin said
“They were beating us down. They were kicking us.
I turned my head right, and they kicked me in my face.
Mainly they were targeting Meek.
I don’t know why they were targeting him so much.”
It turns out that the beating happened one day after a cop claimed he saw Meek
selling crack on the street.
There was no evidence to prove it,
but that ain’t stop the police from almost killing him.
The cops were so violent that one of the cousins thought Meek was dying.
He said “Meek was in the kitchen,
[one officer] was pounding on him, just hitting him and hitting him.
The one time I looked, and he hit me.
And I see Meek’s eyes closed like he was asleep.
And before Meek’s head hit the ground, the guy hit him again,
which actually woke him back up.”
After the cops were finished,
they allegedly ran Meek and his cousin’s pockets and stole their cash.
Meek was arrested and charged with illegal possession of a firearm
and assaulting a police officer, after two cops gave a statement
that said he chased them with a gun and tried to kill him.
But he was eventually let off on probation.
Even though he could have died that night, Meek wasn’t going to let it get in his way.
He kept grinding
and even used the mugshot showing his face all bruised up and bandaged
for the cover of his DC4 mixtape.
Meek and his crew, the Bloodhoundz, released four mixtapes together,
and in 2008 he released his fourth solo project.
He was already buzzing in Philly, but this tape caught the attention of T.I.
who signed Meek to his label.
Signing with T.I. was a “once in a lifetime opportunity” for Meek,
but the good times ain’t last long.
Both of them were dealing with legal issues at the time, and they ended up parting ways
before Meek even released an album.
But luckily for Meek, another big artist already had him on his radar.
Rick Ross hopped on a remix of Meek’s track Rose Red in 2010
after fans told him they needed to collaborate.
The two of them clicked from the jump, so when the deal with T.I. ain’t work out,
Ross came in clutch and signed Meek to his MMG label along with Wale in 2011.
T.I. still had love for Meek, but he ain’t want to hold him back from making it to the top.
He later said in an interview: “I’m happy for his success, I really am.
Do I wish that I did not have to deal with it in that way,
and do I wish that I had a greater involvement? Yeah, sometimes I do,
but at the end of the day, I’ve got to deal with life as it is, not as I wish it was.”
Working with Tip was a dream come true,
but signing to MMG turned out to be the smartest move.
Ross was at the peak of his career, and his cosign helped Meek take it to the next level.
MMG dropped a compilation album in 2011,
and Meek dropped his first mixtape on the label later that year.
Ross and Meek linking up was a huge win for both of them.
In 2012, MTV listed Meek at #7 on their Hottest MCs in the Game list,
and Ross was at the top.
MMG was taking over the industry, and it seemed like nothing could stop them.
Then, Meek dropped his debut album Dreams & Nightmares in 2012
and became one of the rare street rappers to get cosigns from both mainstream icons
like Mariah Carey and hip hop legends like Nas.
Meek was at the top, and Ross was right there with him.
But some fans were surprised that Meek was rocking so heavy with Ross.
Back in 2008, a photo that allegedly showed Ross working as a corrections officer
surfaced online.
A website called The Smoking Gun broke the story and detailed how Ross
worked as a C.O. for 18 months at the South Florida Reception Center.
Working as a C.O. completely went against the image Ross portrayed.
He presented himself as a crime boss moving weight and running the streets,
so the photo of him in a C.O. outfit was a major blow to his reputation.
His rap name comes from a real trafficker named “Freeway” Rick Ross,
who called out the rapper for putting on a front.
Ross denied the accusations at first, but eventually had to come clean
after a ton of evidence was released that proved the story was true.
He addressed the situation on the track Valley of Death, where he rapped
“Call your boy a C.O., but if I really was,
When all these n***as undercover fuckin’ n***as up?
Keep it Trilla, n***a, never had a gun and a badge
Kept a nice watch, smokin’ on a hundred sacks
Only live once and I got two kids
And for me to feed them, I’d get two gigs
I’d shovel ****, I’d C.O.
So we can bow our head and pray over the meatloaf.”
Basically Ross was admitting to working at the prison,
but implied he was hustling at the same time.
A lot of people called him out, but Ross stuck to his crime boss persona
and eventually, everyone just moved on.
Even though Meek really made it out of the gutter,
Ross’s past as a C.O. ain’t stop them from linking up.
And after spending over a decade making music and business moves together,
everyone thought that Meek and Ross would be solid for life.
But it turns out that everything wasn’t as smooth as it seemed from the outside.
Now, the beef is so bad
that Meek allegedly banned Ross from his birthday party and guns were pulled.
In 2021, Meek dropped his fifth album Expensive Pain,
then hopped on Twitter to let the whole world know he wasn’t happy about his label situation.
Meek is actually signed to three different labels right now:
MMG, Atlantic Records, and Roc Nation,
and he ain’t specify which label his tweets were directed at.
One of the tweets said “i haven’t get paid from music
and i don’t know how much money labels make off me!!!!!
I need lawyers asap!!!”
It’s crazy to think that an artist as big as Meek
don’t understand his own label situation, but obviously he ain’t happy with his cut.
No one knew who Meek was calling out,
but Ross said that it must have been Atlantic Records.
He said in an interview “I’ma be honest,
when Meek takin’ a jab at everybody,
the only way I can assume he doing that at Atlantic Records.”
I'ma be honest
when Meek taking a jab at anybody
the only way I can assume is that he doing that to Atlantic Records
Everyone thought Meek beefing with Atlantic instead of MMG made sense
considering how close he and Ross seemed to be,
but then DJ Akademiks came out with a story that changed the entire situation.
According to Akademiks, Meek wasn’t happy with his deal and wanted to get off MMG,
but Ross ain’t want to release him from the contract.
Then Meek allegedly refused to let Ross into his birthday party at a club,
and the situation got so heated that the two sides pulled guns on each other.
This ain’t the first time there’s been drama in the MMG camp.
Back in 2013, Meek called out Wale on Twitter for not supporting his new album.
Meek was also mad that Wale ain’t jump in on his beef with Cassidy.
It seemed like Meek was seriously pressed about it,
but Ross sat them both down and they talked it out.
Then in 2015, Ross called off his engagement to Lira Galore
after an old photo surfaced showing her topless with Meek Mill.
Galore said “It was just a picture that I posted on my Instagram.
I was at work, I used to dance, and it was just a picture.”
But then some of her old tweets about Meek were dug up too.
It all happened a long time ago,
but Ross couldn’t get past it and ended the relationship.
He never called Meek out about it publicly, but who knows how he actually felt about it.
Besides all the personal drama, there’s another big reason
Meek probably wants out of his deals with MMG and Atlantic.
He signed a management deal with Roc Nation back in 2012,
and over the years he’s gotten closer to Jay-Z.
In 2019 he even started his own Dream Chasers Records imprint with Roc Nation.
Meek and Jay-Z also started a criminal justice reform group together
called Reform Alliance in 2018.
It’s obvious that Meek has a lot of respect for Jay
and wants to take his career in the same direction.
Ross and MMG aren’t as hot as they used to be, and Jay-Z is at the top of the game.
So even if Meek and Ross were still close,
linking up with Jay-Z would be a way better long-term plan.
Record labels are ruthless,
and artists who don’t know any better get taken advantage of all the time.
Meek might have had the rug pulled out from under him,
but now he’s being accused of doing the same thing to his own artist.
In February 2022, a producer named Hitkidd hopped on Twitter to air Meek out.
He tweeted “You’ve made plenty statements about signing slave deals
and labels not doing their jobs.
So, I ponder as to why my situation isn’t better.
I wished you gave me them same expectations you expect from the label that you’re signed to.
I don’t want no clout from this, I NEED PEOPLE TO DO THEIR JOBS.”
Meek ain’t responded to the accusation, but right now the whole situation is a mess.
It seems like Meek should understand how the business works,
but for now it sounds like there’s still tension with Ross.
Hopefully, they can work it out and continue making music,
or at least get the business straight and part ways respectfully.