Grammy award winner Ashanti has announced some major music news, sharing that she’s now the owner of all of her masters and is now preparing to independently re-record her 2002 debut studio LP. “I first signed to a record label when I was 14 years old,” she said in an appearance on The Tamron Hall Show. “Then see how things have changed so far. It is very important to have a conceptual understanding of what to sign.”
“The fact that we can re-record the album and put it all together is a great blessing,” she added. “I am grateful. We are still here, living through the pandemic and these blessings. The fact that is still going on makes me very humble.” The news comes just on the heels of her appearance at the Verzuz battle between Ja Rule and Fat Joe. Ashanti famously has popular tracks with both artists. She collaborated with Ja Rule on a number of hits including “Mesmerize” and “Always on Time.” She also worked with Fat Joe on his major hit “What’s Luv?” She also made some salacious headlines the next morning after many speculated there were sparks flying in her on-stage hug with ex-Nelly.
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“I really didn’t expect it, I didn’t know he was gonna be there, honestly,” she said of her and Nelly’s reunion. “So when I saw him kind of coming across the stage, I was just like, ‘Oh…’ and it was so weird because we haven’t seen or spoken to each other for over six years so that was the first time in six years, so it was a weird feeling…I always, like when we first broke up, I would be like, ‘Oh my God, when I see him.’ You know I went through that, and then it was like, ‘Oh, I’m okay.’ You know what I mean? So it had been so long, I didn’t know how to feel or what I was going to feel when I actually did see him. So, that’s what it was like.”
Ashanti recalled on the show first building her relationship with music as a young girl growing up in Long Island, New York. “I used to be downstairs in my section because I wanted to feel like I had my own apartment, muted Cartoon Network, and just wrote.” She says the practice “allowed me to enter my zone.”
The singer’s self-titled debut album, which featured popular hits “Foolish,” “Happy,” and “Baby,” premiered on the Billboard 200 and the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart at no. 1. It went on to sell 503,000 units in its first week –– a record-breaking number for a female artist’s debut project at that point in time.
