50 Cent has had his share of beefs in his career, but his feud with Ja Rule was one of the first high profile rivalries we saw from him. It was pretty clear from the outside 50 that came out on top, with the rapper rising to the top of the rap game, as Ja's relevance quickly waned. What wasn't evidently clear from this perspective was how Ja's deteriorating presence was directly tied to 50's power in the industry.
“It was a lot going on in that time frame,” said Ja in an interview with HOT 97. “You got the federal indictment. Here’s what it is, it was orchestrated very well. He was a part of the juggernauts at that moment. Eminem, Dre, they were very, very big in what they were doing as well. So, as we were big over on our side they were also big on their side. And as everything started to crumble for us as far as we didn’t have a label home anymore, ya understand? There was a lot of things that were falling apart for us. It was easy for him to get people to turn on. And there was things that were behind the scenes that y’all don’t see that also made us seem more irrelevant. Like we couldn’t go to awards shows.”
Head of Murder Inc., Irv Gotti also revealed that his legal troubles coincided with the feud, putting them in an even more difficult position.
“It wasn’t just one thing, like everything came at us." said Irv. "So, I couldn’t even do business because the Feds told Universal if you do any business with Irving Lorenzo, you’re gonna be codefendants with Irving Lorenzo…I couldn’t enter into a new agreement. So, they couldn’t give me no money,” he explained. “They couldn’t do nothing. So, I’m sitting there trying to organize things and do things and I gotta do it with nothing because the Feds is on my back.”
The two recalled hearing Fif's "In Da Club" for the first time. "That record was so dope, I looked at Rule, and was like 'Yo, we got a major problem" said Irv of his initial reaction. "We took the L."
Watch the full interview with Irv and Ja below.