One won’t do, Two is not enough.

A couple of weeks ago in Billboard Magazine, there was an ad put out by someone claiming to be the owner of James “J-Dilla” Yancey’s estate asking people to stop using Dilla’s music/likeness if they didn’t get their approval. Clearly this lead to people wondering who the people who put this ad out were and why they put it out. Pete Rosenberg took the time out to reach out to them and find out the story behind the ad. He posted this response letter and a little bit of his take on it over at his site. The letter reads…

Before I get into this, I just want to say that I am speaking only on my own behalf, not on behalf of the executor or attorney for J Dilla’s estate.

There has been a lot of chatter about the ad taken out by J Dilla’s estate in Billboard a couple of weeks ago- quite a bit of speculation about what the motivation was. I just wanted to say simply- this is about one thing, protecting J Dilla’s legacy for his children. I was brought on as manager for the remaining assets of the estate a couple of months ago (I had managed Dilla for several years while he was alive) and I was shocked, sickened even, to see what’s gone on over the last couple of years.

Now, there are a number of people who have somehow been involved with Dilla’s legacy that had the best of intentions. In fact, I’ve found that most people I’ve spoken to have had nothing but good intentions. They did a deal, released an album, put out some merch in partnership with somebody who claimed to represent the estate. Most of these people only wanted to know that Dilla’s family was benefiting from doing these kinds of things. The message to these people is- reach out to the representatives of the estate, if we can find a way to work things out amicably, we will do everything we can to do so. Ask anyone that has talked to us so far if we have been unreasonable, shady, or wrongly intentioned. As the ad said, the only person who can authorize anything on Dilla’s behalf is Arty Erk, executor for the estate. (Because of a very unfortunate typo, Arty’s email address was incorrectly listed in the ad, it should be DillaEstate@wecnyc.com). IF YOU HAVE A PIECE OF PAPER AND IT’S NOT SIGNED BY DILLA OR ARTY, YOU ARE NOT TALKING TO THE RIGHT PEOPLE.

Then, there is a whole other class of people, who, if you are among them, you know who you are:

• These are people that put out records with Dilla’s name and POCKETED THE MONEY.
• These are people who threw events in cities all over the world claiming to benefit Dilla’s estate and POCKETED THE MONEY.
• These are people who put Dilla’s name or likeness on a t-shirt and never thought once about his family.
• These are people who continue to keep material that Dilla gave them in their basement waiting for their chance to exploit it and make a buck.

Then there is the gray area. People who couldn’t resist. People who couldn’t resist putting Dilla’s unreleased beat tapes on every music blog they could because they wanted to share the music with the world. I get it- but really, do you think that’s right?

I’ll say this simply. I’m sure all of this speculation will continue. So, I want to be very clear. The estate is acting for a single purpose- to make sure that proceeds from Dilla’s work benefit the people Dilla wanted it to benefit. I’m not trying to shut anyone down, kill anyone’s record or party, or assassinate anyone’s character. I’m not flexing my ego or fighting with anyone. I’m only trying to carry out Dilla’s wishes.

So, if you really care about Dilla and his legacy, help DILLA’s ESTATE. Stop swapping files of his beat tapes. Stop releasing illegal product. STOP POCKETING MONEY IN HIS NAME. Tell the people that are doing this to stop. When you do this, and this is not an exaggeration or a joke, you are stealing from children. Come on. You may think you know the REAL story, but I’m telling you, this is the REAL STORY.
Jonathan Dworkin
DillaEstate@room1009.com

…as Peter said himself, I agree with most of what he said but I don’t think (especially in the current state of the music industry) you can ask someone to seriously NOT swap an arists music. Albiet they’ve passed on and you want to respect that, you can’t say the same thing to fans of Biggie, Pac, Pun, etc. and expect everyone to comply with that. Especially Dilla fans whom about 50-60% of them if we want to be real about it learned about Dilla post-his death and got put on thru the sharing of his music, dilla parties, etc. I consider myself one of the lucky people to have had really discovered J-Dilla’s music prior to his death but only by a couple of months. Then once he passed on and more people caught on or were put on to Dilla, more of his music became available to me thru blogs/forums/file sharing. Heck, even I have put on some of my best friends who are now 100% Dilla fans after his death to things he did and they were un-aware of. I can understand wanting to make sure all benefits from anything Dilla did are paid to the rightful owners of his estate but this guy also has to understand that he’s in the same sinking boat the rest of the music industry is in on that fight.

I myself have made tracks over Dilla beats, none of which I have sold but if I ever were to want to put out something publicly over a Dilla beat of course I would go thru the right channels which I now know is this guy so on that note I am not mad at him for putting that out there to anybody who would like to do things the right way. But…it kinda discourages me at the same time b/c it gives off that “…I’ll decide if your product is good enough for a Dilla feature” vibe and I can see why people won’t want to rock with that since he’s not Dilla himself. That leads me to believe that a close friend of Dilla’s could have something they worked on beforehand and want to put it out finally and since this dude doesn’t know him/like him…he won’t approve it just because. That isn’t right in my book. I’m with paying back any royalties that are due if used but not with the whole approving if something is kosher or not based on his own personal opinion of the matter.

Regardless of this whole ordeal, I love Dilla’s music, he has been a major influence on my music ever since I discovered his beats (even the ones I knew of but didn’t know he had produced) and I’m going to continue to support him wether it be on a non-approved shirt, non-approved party, non-approved cd i got thru somebody with hot dilla shit on it, I’m going to rep him all day. I’ll continue to make music over Dilla beats and hopefully one day I can put those tracks out thru the right, legal means. If not, I’ll definitely donate some of those proceeds to the J Dilla foundation and pay back his fam that way…that is what I think he should have stated in that note that he didn’t instead of just asking Dilla fans to not share his music at all…another option that still benefits J-Dilla’s estate.

Anybody know what Dilla’s Mother has to say about any of this? I think it would have been more respectful to have her put out a statement rather than an ad in Billboard to be honest.