Subscribe
HipHopWired Featured Video
CLOSE

Young Money’s Drake has come out swinging against Memphis MC Kia Shine who has made claims that he owns 25% of the Toronto MC’s hit single “Best I Ever Had.” In a post on Drake website, he wrote:

“There have been questions posed to me the last few days about the writing of Best I Ever Had and I figured I’d take the time to clear the air directly. I have never met Kia Shine or worked with him. I wrote the entire composition in Toronto and I borrowed one line from a Lil Wayne song that he produced the BEAT for. The claims of 25% ownership are false and for a artist to brag about splits on a song is distasteful to begin with.”

Kinfolk also responded to the confusion as he hit up the bank to deposit a fat publishing check. Speaking with Global Grind, he stated,

“Basically I did a record for Lil Wayne called “Do It For The Boy,” which was on The Leak mixtape back in October. My dude DJ Absolute & Enuff was spinning the joint in NY. I gave Wayne the joint back in March of ‘08 and I had yet to hear the completed version until Absolute hit me. Actually, he was in the office with my man Daralle Jones at Atlantic. He wanted buy the song from me to use for Jahiem. I tried to contact Young Money to get paid for the original track before I made a move, but couldn’t get anyone to hit me back.

Producer note, as a producer, it‘s tough with mixtapes these days. Artist will rap on a 2 track version of a beat & hook you put on a beat CD to shop and the next thing you know your beat is on the radio. It’s really impossible for Wayne to do a mixtape track, because if the song is a hit, it’s going to touch radio. That’s why whenever I produce or perform on a record I immediately send it to my guy, Maani, on the publishing side to handle all the paperwork, etc.

I get a call from Absolute and he’s like, “Yo, you sold the song to Drake.” I’m like who’s Drake??? Absolute sent me the joint in January and I’m like…wooooow! Drake sampled the melody, some of the words, cadence, etc. So because I had already registered the original record, my business was in order. I sent in the Drake record and let my legal team handle it from there. We were able to settle at 25% of the “Best I Ever Had” publishing. It’s a blessing, but the moral of the story is to “follow up to get your dollars up” and always be prepared and on top of your business. People should really read my discography and they would understand that this in no surprise. They will respect my mind and my grind soon enough.”

Check out Kia Shine looking “Krispy” showing off his Billboard plaques for “Best I Ever Had”.