beef

A Comprehensive History of Wu-Tang Clan's Endless Beefs

Wu Tang Clan at the filming of their new video in Los Angeles, Ca. 9/18/00.

Wu Tang Clan at the filming of their new video in Los Angeles, Ca. 9/18/00.Wu Tang Clan at the filming of their new video in Los Angeles, Ca. nine/eighteen/00. Photograph by Kevin Winter/ImageDirect. Photo: Kevin Winter/Getty Images

Just as a business firm divided against itself cannot stand, a Wu-Tang Clan apparently cannot stand each other. Last week, RZA revealed that he and Raekwon hadn't been speaking and that Raekwon wouldn't be on their upcoming album, A Better Tomorrow. Rae — offended, considering he thought the two had been in communication — announced that he was "on strike." On Monday, RZA tried to make the peace, saying, "When you lot class Voltron, you need every piece. We need [Raekwon] in that location. I want him there. I ask him over and over to be there. Let's just come together." And at present, in an interview with SI Now, he says the following: "The album is slated to come out in July. If we don't come to terms within the side by side 30 days, information technology volition either be an anthology without Raekwon, or an album that never sees the low-cal of 24-hour interval … I would not want to put out a Wu-Tang album without every live fellow member bachelor." And on and on it volition probable go. But these are just the latest crumbles in the Temple of Shaolin. There have been cracks in the foundation since, well, the foundation.

1990s: At first, Wu-Tang'due south internal tension was channeled productively. RZA — the grouping'southward de facto producer and trusted visionary — pits members against one another as they battle to get on his beats, in the hopes of winning "the right to appear on each song."

June 1997: In a Q&A for Rolling Rock, RZA says, "If two parties are disputing [in a Shaolin temple], they would become to the abbot to get a tertiary party'due south thoughts. And then I'm the abbot." Wu-Tang Forever debuts at No. 1 on the Billboard chart, selling 612,000 in the offset week. All is well in Wu world.

July 1997: Rolling Stone's Anthony DeCurtis writes upward a comprehend story, finding that "each fellow member contributes twenty percent of his earnings dorsum to that company, and all of the members share every bit in the profits, regardless of how well their individual albums sold, or whether or not they even fabricated an album." While that might sound pretty good, DeCurtis thinks it's "a blueprint for jealousy and contest — and information technology may somewhen prove to exist" their downfall.

July 1997: The group announces a two-month bout with Rage Confronting the Machine.

September 1997: "It is my understanding, through the twisted labyrinth that is the communication system of the Wu-Tang Clan, that they're not playing any more shows on the tour in part considering of difficulties they're having inside their own group," says Rage guitarist Tom Morello. Presently subsequently, RZA tells MTV that well-nigh of the group wasn't showing upward to tour dates by that point, anyhow.

1999: Under the title "Wu-Tang Forever?" U-God says he's tried to talk to ODB almost his … problems, but that "he's his own man." When told that Method Human "didn't know a Wu-Tang video game was out until someone asked him virtually it," U-God responds "angrily." (Says U-God: "He's on the road, so nobody should inquire him that shit. He'south ever on the fucking road, so he doesn't know what the fuck is going on.")

November 2000: The A.V. Social club reviews The W , proverb it sounds like they're "struggling to make order out of anarchy without being swallowed up by information technology."

2000: RZA calculates that each member of the group would've fabricated $220,000 if only they'd all shown up to concert dates. (The Chicago Tribune adds, helpfully, "They did not.")

June 2001: Method Man lets loose that the Shaolin swordplay has turned inwards and denies that anyone'south busy at piece of work recording their 3rd album Iron Flag since there's "internal bullshit" and "the sales aren't what they used to be." One reason could be that studio sessions aren't every bit full equally they one time were: ODB'due south in jail, GZA opts to ship over ProTools files from afar (no one'southward sure why), and Cappadonna has somehow ended up driving a taxi in Baltimore. It'southward rumored that the FBI has cornered him into acting equally an informant; plainly, there's some connection between the Wu-Tang Clan and the Gambino family. (RZA will later say that the album was put together in 30 days. Upon its release in December, The Guardian's reviewer calls the tape "sloppy and uneven." It lands at No. 32 on the Billboard "200," behind debuts from Nas, Mystikal, and Lil Bow Wow.)

June 2003: Method Man goes on Big Boy's Neighborhood radio prove and lets loose: "Ain't no Wu-Tang album going down unless everybody comes together as a group and stops coming together every bit these solo artists. Everybody, you know, basically, suckin' they self off … you're only as good as your last hit homey. Know what I'm maxim? And our last hitting was 'C.R.Eastward.A.Thou.' That song came out in 1993."

August 2003: MTV reports that neither Raekwon, Inspectah Deck, nor Method Homo like the thought of ODB signing to Roc-a-Fella. "Inspectah Deck compares it to fighting on Iraq'due south side." Meth says, "Brothers ain't actually been in contact with each other. Don't allow none of them fool you like nosotros talk to each other every day, 'cause we don't. Where we're at right now, a lot of people got a lot of issues they gotta bargain with — personal likewise as business." RZA jumps in to say, "I know some [members of the group] are upset about information technology. They're upset well-nigh information technology based on the egos."

November 2003: "Number 1 on my shit list correct at present is [RZA"due south business partner] Divine from Wu-Tang direction. He took something major from me that he had no intention of giving back," said Method Man, speaking to Blender mag.

March 2004: U-God leaves the group, releasing an anti-RZA DVD,Rising of a Fallen Soldier. He accuses RZA of being the devil and a slavemaster, of favoring certain members' projects over his. RZA posts on the Wu-Tang website: "U-Godzilla has a distorted memory of the Wu and his involvement." U-God goes on Hot97 and tells Sway — straight up — that it'southward a publicity stunt … before RZA calls into the show. It's a strange conversation! U-God rejoins the grouping.

Summer 2004: To become ODB to exit his hotel room and perform at Hot97's Summertime Jam, RZA bribes him with an extra five grand.

November 2004: Ol' Muddied Bounder misses another concert, prompting Method Man to call him out onstage: "There'southward no one bigger than the Clan. When you encounter Ol' Dirty Bastard, tell him that." The next day ODB dies at a recording studio from an accidental drug overdose.

2005: Ghostface Killah sues RZA for unpaid royalties. RZA, who also acts as the group's producer, claims his 50 pct take is standard.

August 2007: RZA: "How can hip-hop be dead if Wu-Tang is forever?"

October 15, 2007: Ghostface tells MTV: "the hierarchy at Wu-Tang Association is on some bullshit" and complains that the group is trying to release 8 Diagrams (their anthology) on the exact same day as The Big Dough Rehab (his album), to sabotage him. He closes by maxim, "N***every bit meliorate pay my fucking coin. Matter of fact, they can keep the money — simply get me out of their life right now."

October 22, 2007: "While the Wu-Tang Clan'due south bout has been cancelled until leap 2008 Ghostface volition exist performing on stages throughout the state," reads the Wu website.

Nov 8, 2007: Raekwon tells Hot97'south Miss Info: "One infinitesimal, you my blood brother, one infinitesimal we doing business. … And that's the problem … A n***a may know you beloved them because you love them like that, so next thing you know he uses that equally a weakness against you and your mind." These are shots at RZA, in case you haven't been reading.

Nov viii, 2007: And so RZA responds: "I don't know if everybody agreed with [the idea backside 8 Diagrams]. Everybody has their own opinion. This is in my vision at the end of the mean solar day."

November 27, 2007: RZA yells at U.K. radio DJ Tim Westwood: "I own't never take no money from nobody, and I don't owe nobody no money! Don't never say that. I pay all my bills. I work hard and pay all my bills."

Nov 29, 2007: Bing bong, case closed! Ghostface wins $158,000, proverb, "I just won my court example from them n***every bit. The accommodate been in there for three years. And so put that out in that location. They but lost their fuckin' example. So who don't owe who money? Let'due south go information technology straight, RZA. That'south all I'm sayin', baby. It was a loss, they lost. L-O-South-T. That's really it."

November 29, 2007: Ghostface is on a press run, getting a lot of questions about 8 Diagrams : "That shit is wack. I heard RZA was changing some of the beats around the final infinitesimal. I didn't hear that. I don't know what y'all listening to out there. I never heard it. I'm with Raekwon."

November 29, 2007: More than from Ghostface: "I don't see RZA, human. That northward***a'southward real sneaky. I dearest him, though. Ain't no bad claret. Ain't nobody doing no bad to him. It's merely that you lot can't get coin with a n***a."

November thirty, 2007: Ghostface to Rap Basement: "I've had that engagement since similar last June and the Clan album was supposed to been came out. It was supposed to drib in Baronial, so Oct and I judge it wasn't making the deadlines or whatever. Rza and Divine didn't want me to drop this year. They wanted it to be all about the Wu and it seemed like a lot of funny sh*t was going on. Rza own't listening. He wanted to make [viii Diagrams] how he wanted it and information technology ain't come up out right. He wanna always exercise the whole thing himself, produce the whole album. We're like, permit's bring in some other producers besides. Bring in Kanye, bring in Pharrell. Yous ain't gotta do the whole affair yourself. He wanna brand his own instruments and shit and it sounded real horrible."

December 3, 2007: RZA tells MTV that U-God is blown abroad past everything RZA'southward making, that he believes they're on the right track. As for everyone complaining, " Wow, I thought we were all on the aforementioned page." In the same interview, RZA says, "When we practice come together, a lot of things but seem to evaporate. When we go on the phase together, we can have a problem 10 minutes before we get onstage. But once nosotros're onstage, we feel like everything evaporates."

December 10, 2007: Raekwon says that he'southward supporting the release of 8 Diagrams, after supposedly getting in RZA'due south face and telling him, "This is a Wu-Tang Clan album. This ain't RZA's album." Rae says that he's working on a new album — to be chosen The Wu Tang vs. The Shaolin — and that everyone merely RZA will be on information technology.

December 17, 2007: "We're non so much talking to each other. "We have lawyers speaking to lawyers now," says Cappadonna.

April 2008: Wu-Tang reunites onstage for the kickoff fourth dimension in a yr! RZA's publicist makes a big deal out of saying, " There is no more beef! " to a writer from HipHopDX.

Jan 2008: U-God sues RZA and management for unpaid royalties, a move Raekwon supports, wholeheartedly: "It'south business concern man. Don't take friendship and humbleness outta pocket because we doin' business."

January xiv, 2008: Method Homo: "They said U-God is suing Wu for 170k … that's it?"

July 2008: RZA responds: "They sayin' U-God suing the RZA for a hundred and lxx yard dollars. You know what? I could never owe you a hundred and seventy k dollars. Only even if I did owe you a hundred and lxx thousand dollars, U-God, after all these years of millions you made, motherfucka, y'all gonna come up back and bitch about a hundred and seventy thousand dollars?"

January 2009: "I stopped doing concern with Raekwon," RZA tells MTV. "I said, 'We can be brothers, but we can't do business organisation,' because he was doubting my business judgment. You doing business, you gotta take that faith. It takes religion to do that concern. Me and Ghost is family, then I don't like to speak on that situation, simply he has people around him that's deluded. They make him believe something that's non real. I said this to Ghostface last calendar week on the bus and said to U-God, 'If you endeavour to sue me for $100,000 … I don't owe you shit.' Why would you say something similar that? Yous allow your lawyer gas you lot. I said to Ghost, 'How the fuck I owe you $ii million, God?' Shit is crazy, G. All that shit is actually delusion."

October 2009: CNN has RZA admit that he ran Wu-Tang like a dictatorship for the first five years, a move he doesn't regret.

October 2009: "I take a legal contract with Wu-Tang Productions, matter of fact all of us do. We all signed that. We signed that years ago … Ghost made a deal with someone who thought they should get more from him than what they've got," RZA said, speaking to Vulture.

February 2011: Raekwon does his best to explain the Wu-Tang vs. Shaolin title, which he now claims isn't a knock against RZA. It's but the "strong fighting the motherfuckin' ego." So, in other words, it's sort of a knock against RZA.

July 2011: RZA appeals following his legal loss to Ghostface in 2009. In July of 2011, Judge Kapnick says, "This is one of the most bizarre procedural things I've ever seen," and refuses to meet the case.

Feb 2012: Raekwon tells XXL: "I feel like usa doing solo things hurt us. I never told nobody that. Because when you lot take something so pure and so solid together, it could've been structured more togetherly. It could've been more stronger if we knew we had to stay together like that. Simply when we allow each other to practise us, some did better than others … it jumped into some ego shit. If nosotros would've stayed together, we would've had thirty albums past now."

October 9, 2012: RZA is on with "The Breakfast Order" morn show, where he reveals that "everyone's on lath" for the planned 20th ceremony: world bout, a tape, everything. When asked about Wu-Tang's money problems, he responds, "Money'southward always funny" and then calmly explains why he's getting more money than everyone else. (Short answer: He works harder.)

Oct 17, 2012: RZA tells the New York Times that it's hard to be in charge: "[Laughs] It's like, 'What makes you remember you're the genius?' Earlier, they believed in me like that, they trusted me like that. Now, they've had a gamble to do their own matter, and some things they liked better. Whether information technology was successful or non, they may like it amend. But I would say, if we get i more shot of me beingness completely trusted as the driver of the ship, I call back we could give the world one more than tape, maybe."

Nov 2012: RZA thinks that dealing with Wu-Tang members over the years helped him diffuse problems on the set of The Human being With the Atomic number 26 Fists, his feature film directorial debut. "Me and Meth always used to argue. It's natural. When steel rubs against steel, it makes both blades sharper. Raekwon and Ghostface started off as enemies in the neighborhood. They grew to be best friends after joining the Wu-Tang." Not mentioned: how Rae and Ghost became so close merely after finding a common enemy in RZA.

January 2013: Raekwon says that when Wu-Tang formed xx years prior, the group was built on shaky relationships and mistrust, and only came together because of RZA's diplomacy. At that time, Rae thought Ghostface was a "cheat," though "talented." As he says, "When RZA was the center guy, it was virtually like he did a Gotti move, he brought all the families to the table, and made niggas make amends, due to the fact of how we gon' movement forward and get this money."

March 2013: "I already spoke to the RZA," Cappadonna told Radio.com. "Nosotros've been texting each other. Nosotros're definitely concentrating on more positivity and teachings and trying to put that back into the original recipe for this next Wu-Tang anthology."

July 2013: Cappadonna performs a freestyle for ForbezDVD where he complains about getting paid neither money nor attending.

Baronial 2013: GZA's record label sues U-God's promo team, saying that GZA's song shouldn't have been used the mode it was.

September 2013: Method Homo walks offstage at a Rock the Bells evidence after sound problems. Neither Ghostface nor Raekwon even evidence up, though ODB does — in hologram course.

November viii, 2013: RZA does an interview with Grantland, where he calls out Raekwon, Ghostface, Method Man, and GZA for a lack of effort. "Raekwon hasn't shown upward at all."

November 9, 2013: Raekwon responds on Twitter: "Yea i just read that rza article? Shit is funny to me." (He'll add : "I love u rza, u know what it really is.")

November 12, 2013: The group's official Twitter account blames Raekwon for the delay of their new album, A Amend Tomorrow: "RAEKWON NOT GIVING INPUT HOLDS UP WUTANG CLAN 20TH ANNIVERSARY Album AND Motion." RZA goes on Arsenio, repeating his claims that Ghostface'due south been giving xx pct, Raekwon, none at all.

March 2014: In a sprawling article in which Grantland somehow catches up with all 9 living members of the Wu, Cappadonna says the Wu-Tang legacy is "togetherness!" In the same commodity, it'southward revealed that the grouping is more fractured than always. Raekwon says, "It's similar getting the United Nations to all agree on one fucking thing." U-God complains, "Raekwon is tired of hanging effectually me"; Ghostface has been rebuffing his offer for a full-album team-up, called Goldie and Ghost, for years. Me and RZA "become through it" just "I love this n—. He saved my fuckin' life. He gave me a purpose. Nobody better be disrespecting him in front end of me."

Apr 15, 2014: To absolutely no one's surprise, RZA and Raekwon are still having problems. The bandleader says to VladTV, "I haven't had a take chances to really talk to him about why [he's non involved with the anthology]. But I would say that maybe creatively nosotros on different paths." The headline? "RZA Talks Raekwon Not Being On A Improve Tomorrow."

April 2014: Raekwon is on the telephone with Rolling Stone, where he says he's "on strike." He hates the single they put out. He doesn't like the product. He doesn't like the contracts. He doesn't like that RZA has decided this is the terminal Wu-Tang album. He closes out by maxim, "It'due south sad. It hurts. It's all about the fans. It'south all about them saying, 'This is my favorite fuckin' hip-hop group in the globe.' I have a job to exercise for them. And I would never let my fans downward and brand something I feel is mediocre but to say I made it. That'southward non Raekwon."

April 21, 2014: Responding to the Rolling Stone slice, RZA appears on Hot 97′s "Morning Evidence" and says: "There's no animosity with me and my brothers. My consequence is with fuckin' management. … Raekwon is very important. When you form Voltron, you lot demand every slice. I want him in that location and we need him there." He urges the rest of Wu-Tang to not pay attention to the media interviews and communicate directly with each other.

A Comprehensive History of Wu-Tang Clan's Beefs