The phenomenal hip-hop rapper Cardi B is making a big return in 2020 with a helping hand from Megan Thee Stallion on her latest single, “WAP“, and she once again pays homage to a very special person, Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes.
Cardi B decided to rock a hairstyle in the music video based on the style Left Eye wore at the Soul Train Awards 2000, created by TLC’s long-time hairstylist, Marie Brown (formerly Davis), who is now the owner of Atlanta’s Glamorazzi Salon.
Referencing the afro-futuristic braids, Marie explains how she came up with the creation. “The circles are the little round pieces of styrofoam. Styrofoam from Michael’s. You wrap them around, and they’re just braided on and connected onto her hair. I was just always trying to do something different. I was trying to always reach a different level with her and she was just free to do it.”
Cardi B is no stranger to paying homage to TLC. She previously wore another style like Lisa’s at her Coachella debut in 2018, and also has name dropped Left Eye and TLC in numerous tracks on her debut album, ‘Invasion Of Privacy‘.
Some fans on the Left Eye fanpage The Eye Is Right also noted other similarities in the music video. The scene with Megan and Cardi looking thorough the other rooms is reminiscent of TLC’s “Hands Up” video. And the end scene of the girls running away is very similar to TLC’s “Dear Lie” video, where Lisa knocks on a door and quickly runs away.
Watch the full video:
Do you think Cardi B paid homage or was it a coincidence?
Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes shocked the world when she signed with Suge Knight‘s reinvention of his classic Death Row records, renamed as Tha Row back in 2002, as a result of her disappointment at her home label, Arista Records, failing to support her debut solo album, ‘Supernova‘, in 2001.
Lisa’s new moniker was N.I.N.A (New Identity Non-Applicable) on Tha Row, a name given to her by Knight, as he felt her small frame was like a small 9mm handgun (which has a street name of ‘nina’). When she was spotted with Knight at a Lakers/Grizzlies game in LA on Nov 9, 2001, Lisa explains to EW, “I was visited by a man in my dream, one that sweated me all night about Mr. Suge Knight. He was right, but that’s a whole other story.”
Eastwood, a label mate of N.I.N.A on Tha Row worked with her on her solo project shortly before she passed away on April 25, 2002. He told Variety that he worked on 99.5% of her second solo album, and even co-wrote her verse on TLC‘s single, “Girl Talk“, the lead track from their ‘3D‘ album in 2002.
“You know the song “Girl Talk” with TLC? That was their last joint — I wrote her verse on there. If you go back and listen to it, you’ll hear me respond to her in the beginning of that verse. This happened three days before she passed”, Eastwood said.
Producer Darren Vegas worked on the majority of the tracks for the N.I.N.A project, and when she tragically passed away he was given the task to work with material that was left over, mostly comprising of masters from her previous solo album. “Her vibe was real cool,” he says. “I expected her to be all wild and stuff from what I’d heard, [but] she was real laid back and calm”, he told LA Weekly.
“When she was [signed to Tha Row] she didn’t drink at all. She was on a cleanse, and she actually got artists at Death Row to do cleansings, as she was back and forth to Honduras”, he continues. “She just seemed real determined to have the world hear a solo album. The stuff we were working on, we weren’t copying what she had done [with TLC]. We were creating a brand new sound.”
Many of the tracks were released online over the years as the project was eventually abandoned, officially. Jordan Cooper of the Left Eye fanpage The Eye Is Right decided that the project deserved some more attention, and decided to compile all of the available material from the project as one album for all to enjoy.
After creating some polls with fans on social media, the title of the project was decided as the self-titled ‘N.I.N.A‘, which was released on July 25, 2020 via the fanpage. It also features a version of “Too Street 4 TV” featuring Brandy‘s brother Ray-J, who also signed to Tha Row for a brief period of time.
‘Tha Row Presents… N.I.N.A.’
Tracklist:
1. Block Party (featuring Eastwood and Phobia)
2. Life (featuring Danny Boy and Eastwood)
3. Let Me Live (featuring Crooked I)
4. Universal Quest (featuring Crooked I)
5. Rags to Riches (featuring Kurupt)
6.Untouchable (with 2Pac)
7. I Believe In Me
8. Hot Lanta (featuring Kurupt and Juvenile)
9. Tru Confessions
10.Too Street 4 TV (featuring Danny Boy)
11. Friends (featuring Kurupt and Danny Boy)
Bonus Tracks:
12. Life (Alternate Version) (Featuring Carl Thomas and Eastwood)
13. Too Street 4 TV (OG Version) (Featuring Ray J.)
14. Crush on You (with Ejypt)
Melanie C of the Spice Girls recently spoke about TLC on her regular #AskMelanieC Q&A session on Facebook Live in May, and focused her favourite member, Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes, with whom she famously worked with on her #1 single, “Never Be The Same Again” in 2000. This was the second time this year Mel praised Lisa publicly, she spoke about her in April as part of the Track-By-Track celebration of her debut album, ‘Northern Star‘.
Melanie said that she and the rest of the Spice Girls loved TLC and were inspired by them in the early days. When discussing how her collaboration with Lisa happened, she says that it became a reality when she decided her song needed a rap and only wanted Left Eye to do it. The producer Rhett Lawrence had previously worked with TLC and was able to reach out and Lisa loved the idea.
Credit: Ron Davis
“When writing the song, we got to the middle eight where the rap is — the middle eight is the bit where the music is on it’s own which is completely different to the verses and the chorus, about three quarters of the way in”, Melanie explains. “I could just hear a Lisa ‘Left Eye’ styled rap, the way she had a unique style and the rhythms that she used.”
“She recorded the rap — Lisa was one of the writers of the rap, but she had a little team that they wrote it together with”, Melanie recalls. “It was a brilliant rap, and it really works with the song. The context is just so brilliant. It was meant to be. I’m very proud that I got to work with her”.
Melanie remembers the different occasions she was able to hang around Lisa to get to know her more. “We hung out a few times. I wasn’t in the studio when she recorded her rap. I must have been in the UK at the time. It was sent to me and I loved it immediately”, she confessed. “We hung out in LA just to get to know each other a little bit — we shot the video together obviously”.
“One of my favourite moments would be learning the dance. Doing the video was really fun because that was when we really got to work properly together”, Melanie said. “She came to the the UK to do some promo for Top Of The Pops and we did some MTV stuff. It was just amazing to work with her and get to know her for a bit. She was like a force of nature”.
Melanie got emotional when she recalls the moment she was told about the news that Lisa had passed away. “It was such a shock when I got the call. I was in Italy when she passed away — she was in a car accident and she was only 30, so it was very sad indeed”, Mel said. “Whenever I do the song [live] I always think of her”.
Melanie C had the opportunity to meet Tionne “T-Boz” Watkins and Rozonda “Chilli” Thomas for the first time in 2018, when she performed at the same Mighty Hoopla festival that TLC were headlining in London and admits that seeing them without Lisa made her feel emotional.
“I did the song at the Mighty Hoopla a few years back and TLC were headlining that gig and it was the first time I had met T-Boz and Chilli”, she recalls. “I was so excited to meet them and I just burst into tears because it made me think of Lisa”, an emotional Mel recalls before changing the subject.
Melanie C’s new single, “Who I Am“, is out now. Watch TLC in their latest TV project ‘Iconic: TLC‘
Ever since the debut solo album by the ‘L’ of TLC, Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes, was denied a US release by Arista Records back in 2001, fans all over the world have been craving it’s presence in the digital era — the album, ‘Supernova‘ was only released in Japan and Europe, and still til this day has not been made available on any streaming platforms such as Spotify, Apple Music and Google Play.
Over the years fans of the album began finding creative ways to get the album the justice that it deserved. Last year, Jordan Cooper, who runs the popular Left Eye fanpage/site The Eye is Right, began a petition to help the album achieve justice with a full release to digital platforms. The petition gained a lot of interest and it later became clear that the album was not owned by Sony as previously thought.
Things began to look brigher for ‘Supernova’ this week. Lisa’s sister, Reigndrop Lopes, joined a live chat on Instagram with Shekinah Anderson to celebrate the life of Left Eye on her Birthday — she would have turned 49 on this day (May 27). During the chat Reigndrop told fans that she had acquired the rights to the full ‘Supernova’ album!
Reigndrop is very aware that fans really want this spiritual masterpiece available on all streaming platforms, so she promised to make that happen. She said that she has the rights to do whatever she wants with it. However, she said that she didn’t just want to put it out there, she wanted to do it right and release it at the right time.
In another live chat on Instagram, this time inviting fans to join her for a joint live chat, she further confirmed details about her plans for ‘Supernova’ when she spoke to Jordan, who asked her some specific questions about the release. She will indeed release the album in it’s original form to digital platforms, which will please the fans of the original album.
In the absence of the album, fans have been making the most of the only other Left Eye album online, 2009’s ‘Eye Legacy‘, released by Mass Appeal, which remixed the majority of the tracks on ‘Supernova’. Fanpage Ultimate TLC as well as The Eye is Right used the album as a basis for a streaming party on Left Eye’s birthday this year.
Reigndrop also revealed that she is still working on a script for the upcoming Left Eye biopicwhich she will be executive producing. She will also be in charge of casting the actors who will need to fit all the criteria to fit the role of playing Lisa in the movie. Reigndrop says the biopic will go into more depth of Lisa’s childhood and upbringing to help fans know how she became the woman we all grew to know and love.
Reigndrop is also still working on a book of memoirs about her sister. She wants the book to include the insights of people that have known Lisa. The book with Hype Williams, based on Lisa’s book ‘Open‘ — the original idea to feature an exclusive photo shoot she did with him is also still in the works, which Reigndrop will be a part of.
Are you excited about ‘Supernova’ being made available to streaming platforms?
Leon@TLCArmy
