Diddy to (Maybe) Shut Down Bad Boy - What the F**k Is Up With Bad Boy? Posted by Nathan S. on 01/30/14 | Filed under Opinion, Diddy, Bad Boy

According to the internet, Diddy's preparing to shut down his once extraordinarily powerful and game changing label, Bad Boy. Also according to the internet, the moon landing never happened. So before we start throwing dirt on Bad Boy's casket let's wait for an actual, official announcement. 

But while I won't be writing this as a news piece, it did get me thinking - just what is the deal with Bad Boy right now? Exactly what would be getting shut down? Do I even know what artists are on the label now? What has been going on while Diddy's been launching Revolt and building Ciroc and didn't he have some water thing with Mark Wahlberg? 

All good questions, I'm glad I asked them. While I previously did a breakdown of every artist in Bad Boy history, this time around I want to focus on the more recent signings. Let's start by taking an inventory of the modern era of Bad Boy, and by "modern" I mean after 2005 because, you know, that seems like as good of a year as any. Here's every artist signed to Bad Boy post '05: 

Cassie - Goddamn, I mean goddamn, but as an artist? The last seven years of her musical output has consisted of a mixtape people didn't really notice. So...yeah. But goddamn.  

Janelle Monae - Easily Bad Boy's most successful and critically heralded artist of the last few years, and also easily the Bad Boy artist that no one actually knows is signed to Bad Boy. From production to guest features and everywhere in between, besides printing up some posters, it's hard to see what Diddy's actually done for Monae...except show up for the occasional photo op. 

Red Cafe: Um...

French Montana: HAAAN?!?! In terms of just being a widely recognized figure in hip-hop, French is Diddy's biggest modern success (take that for what it's worth.) Also, his album flopped, and he signed a joint-deal with MMG, with whom he's far more closely associated with. So....

Machine Gun Kelly: Maintains a hardcore loyal fan base, but Bad Boy wasn't able to really put him on that larger, mainstream level, at least not yet.

Los: I'd like to be able to say this without sounding like a proverbial hater, but while I sometimes listen to him and the dude can definitely rap, I don't see what he's doing but turning out (dope) freestyles and mixtapes. 

Megan Nicole: Diddy's most recent signing. She's YouTube famous for covering other people's songs on YouTube. YouTubitty Tubity Tubity Tube. 

Even giving Diddy every possible benefit of the doubt, the modern era for Bad Boy has been somewhere in between meh and mediocre. But granted, not all of that is a label head's fault. Some artists look like they're going to be huge signings, and then just disappear for reasons they have no control over. It's impossible to bat 1.000 running a label, and we just don't hear about most of those artists that sign and then...

So maybe it'd be fairer to compare Diddy to Jay Z and Roc Nation. After all, Jay's equally busy and focused on other things. Ok, so, as of right now, the Roc Nation label (not management or publishing) consists of J. Cole, Rita Ora, Willow Smith, Calvin Harris, Jay Electronica, Rihanna, DJ Mustard, Hugo and Mayaeni.

Out of those, I'd say two are superstars (Rihanna and Calvin Harris), one's a star (J. Cole), one's in that eh class (Rita Ora), three are on the "come up" (Mayaeni, Hugo and DJ Mustard) and no one knows what the fuck is going on with the other two (Jay Elec and Willow Smith). 

So while Roc Nation is far from perfect, they're certainly crushing Bad Boy, and I'd say that MMG is working them over pretty good as well. The house that Diddy built might not be at that G-Unit level yet, where the label's essentially non-functioning, but as of writing this, Bad Boy's much closer to G-Unit than anywhere near the top. 

Only time will tell if Diddy actually does shut down the label; if he doesn't, he clearly needs to make some huge changes if he wants to bring it back to any real relevance. And if he does choose to close down Bad Boy's doors, the legendary label will have, in the words of T.S. Eliot, ended not with a bang, but with a whimper. 

At least we'll always have the shiny suit era. Ah, memories...

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