Let's Take It From The Top: Antoinette's Interrupted Career Still Inspires Queue Points
Rapper Antoinette, whose two albums "Who's The Boss" and "Burnin' at 20 Below" are long out of print, isn't forgotten by DJ Sir Daniel and Jay Ray. You shouldn't forget her either.
Antoinette, the rapper from Bronx, NY, isn't as famous as some of her peers or today's hip-hop artists, but is still significant in the history of the culture. Known for her relentless flow and cadence, Antoinette was definitely “next to blow” when she hit the scene in late 1988.
Her rise to fame was closely tied to her collaboration with producer Hurby Luv Bug. At the onset of her career, the rapper was associated with Hurby’s the Idol Makers, even appearing in their classic crew photo.
It was Luv Bug who produced the universally lauded, classic track, “I Got An Attitude,” which was included on the album Hurby’s Machine: The House The Rap Built.
What should have been a victory lap, didn’t turn out that way. “I Got An Attitude” placed Antoinette at the center of a controversy that she knew nothing about, at the time. As it turns out, “I Got An Attitude” jump started one of the most infamous diss wars in hip hop history - MC Lyte vs. Antoinette.
Antoinette was censored by her management team, and couldn’t respond.
“A true battle for me meant being somewhere at the same time spitting rhyme for rhyme, not that song shit. If going to do it for real, I wanted no holds barred rather than the punk vinyl surprise. This is how I came up. Battling was the norm, and I was willing to go head to head. Instead, I was forced to sit back as my competitor freely challenged my womanhood and authorship, while I grappled with my manager and company censorship. I was deflated.”
- Antoinette from her memoir All That Glitters: From Attitude To Gratitude
Despite this, the rapper pressed on.
With two albums - 1989’s “Who’s The Boss” and 1990’s “Burnin’ at 20 Below” - fans thought that Antoinette’s career was poised to blow. After those two albums, it turns out, she chose to step away from the industry.
What the audience didn’t know was the rapper was in a predatory management deal and dealing with personal tragedies.
“I was done. I quit. I was completely finished with the music business. I wasn’t making any money off my own material or performing like I should’ve been anyway. Promoting my work or building relationships with my peers didn’t happen either, because [Matthew] Klein held me hostage, so to speak. It sucked all of the life and passion out of me; I wanted no parts of it. I was not going to hang around and let Klein make another cent off me. The exploitation was too high, and I had goals and aspirations.”
- Antoinette from her memoir All That Glitters: From Attitude To Gratitude
While we understand the tendency, it’s imperative that Antoinette not solely be defined by a diss war. Despite her interrupted career, she is an MC that deserves our attention, for her musical contributions, as we celebrate 50 years of hip hop (#HipHop50).
With several classics from 1988-1990, she inspired a generation of MCs and a couple podcasters. :-)