B5 have said they didn’t receive any publishing royalties despite Diddy saying he returned all rights to Bad Boy Records
In September, it was reported that the New York rap mogul was in talks with his former signees to return their publishing rights to them. This included the catalogues of Notorious B.I.G, Faith Evans, Ma$e and more.
Sitting down with The ShadeRoom, the 2000s R&B boyband B5 were asked if they “benefitted” from Diddy’s decision to return the rights to artists. Dustin Breeding said “that’s a discussion” that he and his brothers need to have with him. Carnell Breeding added: “We didn’t hear anything. We didn’t get no calls or nothing like that from them”.
Eldest brother Dustin continued: “Puff, Diddy, yeah, we all want our publishing too. We were so young at the time, we didn’t understand the business of it. But looking back now, damn, why our names wasn’t on the credit? You know what I mean? Where the percentages at? Where the pub[lishing credits] at?”
Kelly Breeding added: “There was really no one to step in place and be like, ‘Yo, where’s the split sheets at? Make sure he gets this percentage.’”
At the end of the clip, the group were asked if they regretted leaving Bad Boy Records in the late 2000s. All of the members shook their heads no and Patrick answered, “We just couldn’t see eye to eye so we decided to split.”
B5 rose to fame in 2005 after they released their Billboard Top 20 self-titled debut album, which was executively produced by Diddy. Their breakthrough song ‘All I Do’ was a cover of The Jackson 5 single, ‘All I Do Is Think Of You’, and was similar to Troop’s 1990 Number One rendition of the same song.
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They left Bad Boy Records after their second album, ‘Don’t Talk, Just Listen’, failed to surpass the success of ‘B5’. The band has since released music independently alongside their solo projects.
Other Bad Boy artists have been vocal about wanting their masters and publishing rights back, most noticeably Ma$e. In 2020, Ma$e said that he attempted to buy his rights back for $2million (£1,606,680) despite being paid $20,000 (£16,069.20) for them. This August – by way of Cam’Ron – the rapper confirmed that he got his masters back from Diddy this year.
In September, Diddy released his first solo album in 17 years, ‘The Love Album: Off The Grid’, and had guest spots from John Legend, Mary J. Blige, The Weeknd and more. It serves as the follow-up to his 2006 album ‘Press Play’ which featured the hit single ‘Last Night’ with Keyshia Cole, ‘Come To Me’ with Nicole Scherzinger, ‘Tell Me’ with Christina Aguilera and more.
This week saw Diddy’s ex Cassie, real name Cassandra Ventura, file a lawsuit accusing him of rape and physical abuse. On Saturday (November 18), the lawsuit was settled one day after it was formally filed. His recent appearance on the Graham Norton show then surfaced, explaining why he changed his name to ‘Love’.
