Joe Budden has seemingly accepted full responsibility for the demise of Slaughterhouse, a rap quartet that involved himself, Crooked I, Joell Ortiz and Royce Da 5’9.
In a snippet of an upcoming interview with Drink Champs, Budden, who previously denied having a role in the group’s split admitted he ‘ruined everything.’
“Give me the blame. I’ll take it. I ruined everything. Everything that you loved, I ruined that sh-t” expressed Joe Budden. “Even now, ten years long of just stories and talk, I did it. It was me,” he added.
While it’s possible Budden is being sarcastic with his comments, KXNG Crooked revealed last year that the retired rapper was the catalyst behind the group’s desolation. During an interview with Bootleg Kev, he explained the group had an opportunity to be featured on one of Eminem’s projects, for their track, “Session One,” but Joe wasn’t available because unbeknownst to them, the Pump It Up raper was tied to another deal.
“Joe was signed to another label and caught up in some paperwork,” he said. “They called over to Shady like, ‘Hey we have him under contract, you have to get a clearance from us to have him appear on the song.’ All of us supposedly free agents to sign this deal with Shady, and come to find out Joe was on the paperwork, he said that they forged his signature and that wasn’t him.”
He added: “The group was put on the shelf for a minute while he was fighting amalgam digital label in court, and we were waiting on Joe because we couldn’t move forward, and that took months.”
Joe Budden eventually became embroiled in podcasting and seemingly no longer had interest in making music, to the disgust of fellow Slaughterhouse members KXNG Crooked and Joell Ortiz, who were both forced to announce the group’s death on their joint album The Rise And Fall Of Slaughterhouse.
On one of the standout tracks from the album, Vacancy, Crooked and Ortiz painfully talked about the group’s split. Joell rapped about Ex-Slaughterhouse member, Joe Budden’s retirement and says Royce wasn’t interested in a Slaughterhouse reunion if Joe wasn’t going to be involved.
“Royce said he ain’t doing the three-man without Joe/But Joe said he retired so how the hell is supposed to go?” raps Joell Ortiz.
They elaborated further with a Twitter space called Rise And Fall Of Slaughterhouse, where they spoke about the breakup. Crooked says he and Joell tried several times to get the group back together, and were able to secure a lucrative major deal after they left Shady Records, but Royce, and crucially Joe Budden wasn’t interested.
“Brought a great opportunity to the group that would allow us to release an album on major distribution and Joe didn’t wanna do it, plus Royce said he didn’t wanna do it without Joe, That’s facts!,” said Crooked.
“Slaughterhouse died that day,” he declared. “When Joe declined the greatest deal… I’ve been in this game a long time, I’ve been on three major labels in my career, I know a good deal when I see one. When Joe said he wasn’t doing that, and Royce said he wasn’t doing it without Joe, the group was dead.”
