Rolling Stone‘s damning exposé about Sean “Diddy” Combs has revealed that The Notorious B.I.G. was supposedly planning to leave the music exec’s Bad Boy Records just before his death.
Several people who were interviewed for the piece corroborated the story, stating that Combs was in a battle against the late rapper’s lawyers as he was attempting to regain his publishing rights. “I will never give it up until I’m dead and my bones are crushed into powder,” the exec said as per the book The Big Payback. Hip-hop photographer Monique Bunn said, “[Biggie] was absolutely about to leave Puff. I know for a fact [because] he told me that,” while another unnamed source added, “Everybody wanted to leave Puffy. Everybody leaves him.”
When Biggie Smalls was shot and killed in March 1997, Combs reportedly took this situation and “capitalized on the shock and sorrow.” He denied the leave request of LaJoyce Brookshire, Arista and Bad Boy’s former publicity director who was travelling with the rapper the day before his death. Instead of letting her process her grief, he tasked her with ensuring that Biggie’s posthumous album Life After Death would go No. 1 upon its release.
A few months after the killing, Bad Boy was approached by Rolling Stone for a cover opportunity — one that label co-founder and then-president Kirk Burrowes suggested go to the late rapper. “[Combs’s] like ‘No, he’s dead. I’m putting out [Combs’ debut album, No Way Out] in July. I need to be on the cover of Rolling Stone,’” Burrowes shared, and it ultimately landed Diddy on the cover of an August 1997 issue. That unsavory move was looked down upon even by Death Row Records’ Suge Knight, who is known for his violent temper and is currently in jail for a manslaughter sentence. “When Pac left, I didn’t pick up a microphone,” Knight said on his Collect Call podcast. “I picked up the pieces.”
