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Bad Boy Records (originally Bad Boy Entertainment) is an East Coast hip hop record label founded by producer/rapper Sean "Diddy" Combs in 1993. Currently, it is a subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Company history

Beginnings

After his climb from a non-paying internship to becoming an A&R executive at Uptown Records, Sean ("Puffy") Combs was abruptly terminated in 1993 by the then CEO Andre Harrell — reportedly due to his own difficulty to work with. Upon his firing, Arista Records chief Clive Davis took advantage of Combs' free agent status and agreed to bankroll him his own vanity label to be operated through Arista and its BMG parent.

Bad Boy Entertainment (as it was originally called) was quickly established. A handful of the acts who had been signed to Uptown via Combs just prior to his dismissal were dropped from the label; among them were Christopher Wallace (aka The Notorious B.I.G.), and Craig Mack — both of whom Combs would take with him to his new company.

The label's first release was Craig Mack's "Flava In Ya Ear," followed quickly by Mack's debut album, Project: Funk Da World. On the heels of these releases came 1994's "Juicy" and Ready To Die, the lead single and debut album from The Notorious B.I.G. (who would also be referred to as "Biggie"). Both albums achieved multi-platinum success. The latter, however, went on to become a monster hit — dominating the charts into 1995, making B.I.G. the label's premier star. Also in 1995, the label continued its success with platinum releases by Total and Faith Evans.

At this time the label had a bevy of in-house producers that Puffy operated like a production team, including Easy Mo Bee, Nashiem Myrick and D Dot, who would frequently work closely with each other, and who would become instrumental in creating the poppish mainstream sound Bad Boy was to become associated with. Following up on its success with Big, Puffy signed several rappers including Lil' Kim, The LOX and Black Rob.

Bad Boy—vs—Death Row

Probably the most famous rap feud of recent times was the early to mid-1990s rivalry between the East Coast's Bad Boy Records and the West Coast's Death Row Records. It was dubbed by the media a "coastal rap war" when in actuality, it consisted mainly of shots taken by Death Row artist 2Pac at numerous rappers, primarily The Notorious B.I.G.

In 1994, just before the release of Biggie's debut Ready to Die, 2Pac was shot and robbed in a recording studio, just downstairs from Big and his entourage. The next day, Shakur was convicted of a 1993 sexual assault on a female fan. While he was in jail, he began hearing about Bad Boy's success with Ready to Die and that the man who'd shot him had been Biggie's friend, and began to suspect the group of setting him up. His exact allegations, as given in an interview for Vibe magazine, state that when they saw he was shot they offered him no help; he also accused B.I.G. of knowing the robbery was going to happen and failing to warn him.

In 1995, Death Row CEO Marion "Suge" Knight mocked Bad Boy CEO Puff Daddy at the Source Awards in August 1995, announcing to the assembly of artists and industry figures: "If you don't want the owner of your label on your album or in your video or on your tour, come sign with Death Row," a reference to Puffy's tendency of adlibbing on his artists' songs and dancing in their videos.

Things escalated when Suge was at a party for Southern producer Jermaine Dupri in Atlanta, Georgia. During that time, a close friend of Suge's was fatally shot outside. Suge accused Puffy--who was also present--of having something to do with the shooting, deepening Knight's grudge against Puff. Later that year, Suge would approach 2Pac, offering to pay his bail if the rapper would sign with Death Row Records. Shakur agreed, and when he was released began taking numerous shots at his former friends and their record label with Suge backing him.

The Notorious B.I.G. would release a track called "Who Shot Ya" in late 1995; Tupac interpreted it as Big mocking his shooting, and claimed it proved that Bad Boy had set him up. In early 1996, Pac released the infamous diss track "Hit 'Em Up," in which he claimed to have had sex with the Notorious B.I.G's wife Faith Evans and threatened the lives of Biggie and Puffy. The song was viewed as taking the feud to another level. On the song he also dissed Mobb Deep and New Jersey rapper Chino XL.

On September 7, 1996 Tupac Shakur was shot several times in Las Vegas, dying a few days later on Friday 13. Then on March 9, 1997, Notorious B.I.G. was shot and killed in Los Angeles, California. Both murders remain unsolved, and numerous theories (some of them conspiracy theories) have sprung up. These include, most notoriously, that Shakur faked his own death.

Life after Biggie

Posthumously, Biggie's Life After Death entered Billboard Top 200 Albums Chart at number one; its first single "Hypnotize" also topped the singles charts. The rapper's death had fueled album sales, and by year's end Life After Death had sold over 2 million units.

In early 1997, Combs had begun recording his own solo album. His first single, "Can't Nobody Hold Us Down," hit number one on the rap, R&B, and pop charts that spring. In response to Biggie's death, the company rush-released a Diddy tribute song "I'll Be Missing You", which featured Biggie's widow, Faith Evans, and Bad Boy's teen R&B singing group 112. The song topped the charts for ten weeks and became the hasty second single from Combs' album, No Way Out, which was released in the summer and sold seven million copies. Combs' newest protégé, *], was immediately thrust into the void that Biggie left. His own debut album, Harlem World, was also released in 1997 and would go four times platinum.

By the end of 1997, Bad Boy as a label and brand name had hit its commercial peak, due to the successive successes of Life After Death, No Way Out, and Harlem World. The LOX left the label, putting in effect a publishing dispute that would continue up until 2005. However, Puffy found some success with Shyne, a young rapper from Brooklyn who would garner much criticism for his deep voice and slow flow; many claimed he sounded too much like Biggie and labeled him an imitator.

In the years to follow, however, Bad Boy would begin to decline. In 1999, Ma$e became religious and abruptly retired from the business to become a pastor — which left a serious dent in the company, especially since his sophomore album had just been released. Combs' own follow-up albums failed to generate the same kind of attention that his first did. In an attempt to further market himself, he underwent several name changes; from "Puff Daddy" to "P. Diddy", to now simply "Diddy". Additionally, after an incident with Puffy and Shyne at a club in which several people were shot, Shyne was sentenced to ten years in prison. A posthumous Biggie release, Born Again, was the most-noticed release the label had seen since '97.

As the 2000s emerged, Bad Boy began to noticeably flounder. Many of its more noted acts would eventually vacate the label, while those who remained saw their sales dwindle as time went on. G Dep and Black Rob would both release albums on Bad Boy that gained little attention; in spite of continually releasing new material, and various attempts at building artists to the status of Bad Boy's deceased icon, none proved as successful as the company hoped. Southern duo 8Ball & MJG released an album called Living Legends to some success in 2004, opening up the Bad Boy South imprint; following this, has increasingly gone the route of Southern acts such as Boyz N Da Hood and Young Joc.

Diddy also made attempts at success with resident New Yorkers with his "Making da Band" reality TV show and the subsequent group album, as well as signing a rapper named Aasim, though the former quickly disbanded and the latter hasn't been heard from since his signing.

Arista Records bought a 50% stake in Bad Boy in 1996. Following Clive Davis's departure from its parent company, the label broke ties with Arista and BMG; moving to Universal Music Groups' Universal Records in 2002. The change of distribution, however, did not increase productivity. In 2005, Warner Music Group bought out the remainder of Bad Boy's agreement with Universal Music Group, then bought a large minority stake in the label. Today the label is distributed through WMG's Atlantic Records, and continues to operate.

Artists

Bad Boy Entertainment

Diddy has been signing new artists to the Bad Boy family. These artists are Nelson, Yung Joc, Elephant Man & Resigned Tammy Ruggeri

Bad Boy Latino

In 2005, Combs started Bad Boy Latino. It has offices in Miami and New York. It's focus is not just hip hop, but also Latin Soul and Tropical music. It is created through a colaboration with Emilio Estefan,

Bad Boy South

Bad Boy South is based in Atlanta, Georgia.

Former Bad Boy artists

External links

Bad Boy | Hip hop record labels | Rhythm and blues record labels | Vanity labels | Warner Music labels

Bad Boy Entertainment | Bad Boy Records | Bad Boy Records | Bad Boy Entertainment | Bad Boy Records

 

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the "Bad Boy Records".

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