Teyana Taylor Shades Kanye West & Claims His Record Label ‘Underappreciated’ Her

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Teyana Taylor opened up about her surprising retirement from music in December 2020, revealing that Kanye West played a role in the hard decision. It came down to Teyana, 30, feeling that her music went “underappreciated” under Kanye’s G.O.O.D Music label, she said on the April 28 episode of Sip ‘N Smoke. “I put in a lot of work [and] I felt like the label wasn’t really hearing me and [seeing] me,” she told host Cam Newton.

Kanye signed Teyana to his label in 2012 when she was working with him on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. She released three albums under G.O.O.D Music, the last being The Album in June 2020. Just six months later, she announced that she was done with music despite her success on the charts (163 million streams on Spotify in 2020 alone). “I am going to feel underappreciated if I’m putting in 110 percent and my label is giving me… what, 10 percent of that,” Teyana explained to Cam. “It’s not that I retired permanently, it’s more like, I don’t want to move another inch for a company.”

Teyana’s comments on Sip ‘N Smoke echo what she revealed when she announced that she was quitting the music industry. “Retiring this chapter of my story with the comfort that I can depart with peace of mind seeing that all the hard work and passion put in was indeed loved and supported somewhere in the world,” she wrote on social media.

“I ain’t gone front [I’m] feeling super underappreciated as an artist, receiving little to no real push from the ‘machine,’ constantly getting the shorter end of the stick, being overlooked,” Teyana added. “I mean the list [goes] on and on.” After posting, Teyana did receive an outpouring of love and support from her friends in the music industry including Cardi B.

Cardi took to Twitter after the announcement to sing Teyana’s praises and rave out The Album. “If you know me then you know Teyana Taylor’s album it’s my favorite of 2020,” Cardi tweeted. “I swear she really got the best album this year.I hate that she feels how she feels cause she sooo talented and the music is soo good.”