For their ground-breaking debut record Below the Heavens, Blu & Exile have admitted they never got any royalties; however, this is supposedly about to change.
Exile, the West Coast duo’s producer, posted on Instagram on Monday (July 17) to announce that, financially speaking, they now have control of their debut project.
“Happy 16th anniversary to our first album Below The Heavens!,” he wrote. “This anniversary is unusual, because for the last 16 years, the album was snatched from us, and we haven’t been seeing a cent from it since our initial tiny advance. But the 16th year is different, since we finally worked out how to get our baby back!”
The album is now legally held by Blu and Exile, ladies and gentlemen, he said. Therefore, if you have any faith that the money will eventually reach us, run these numbers up. Increase these figures! Come support our second album anniversary on July 29 in SF and July 30 in LA! Special thanks to @thedirtyscience @soulspazm & @fatbeats [two prayer hands emojis]! The next year [red heart] will see our vinyl repress for BTH.
Before collaborating with Exile, who was a member of the rap trio Emanon with singer Aloe Blacc in the middle of the 1990s, Blu generated a lot of attention in the music industry.
In the midst of the blog era, Blu & Exile’s debut album Below the Heavens was published in 2007. For both artists, the album was a major commercial and critical triumph.
They put out an album in 2017 called Beginning: Before the Heavens, which is a collection of unfinished songs from Below the Heavens. The band at the time spoke to Billboard about how they felt about the success of their debut album and how their devoted fans’ support has helped them to continue.
The majority of our fan base, according to Blu, “came from that first album we made together, which is pretty cool.”
Exile continued, “I’m extremely thrilled to have created a ‘classic’ Hip Hop album. It’s been a dream of mine forever. I appreciate the support from the public for all the music Blu and Exile, Blu, Med, and Madlib, as well as our crew DS, Dirty Science: Choosey, Dag Savage, Fashawn, Cashus King f.k.a. CO$$, Blame One, etc., have released together.