As a young teenager, Teyana Taylor signed a recording contract with Pharrell Williams’s Star Trak Entertainment record label before she was introduced on MTV’s My Super Sweet 16.
In a recent interview with the Angie Martinez IRL Podcast, the singer shared her thoughts about being on Star Trek Entertainment when she was only 15 years old. Taylor said she was new to the industry and needed guidance then, and felt Pharrell should have stood up and fought more on her behalf.
“For me, that 15-year-old, that girl just needed you to fight a little harder. You know what I’m saying? Needed you to maybe push even if you didn’t have the strength to,” she told Martinez.
“I just needed you to push for me more.”
The mom of two also revealed that during her time as Pharrell’s artist, she didn’t feel protected, and felt like the music producer fed her “to the wolves.”
The Harlem native alluded to Pharrell’s laidback persona, describing him as one of the “easiest people in the whole wide world.” Yet, when people started coming around and mishandling her and “started going into the cookie jar,” she said he did not protect her.
“To me, as a 15-year-old, it was, you didn’t protect me. You let everyone mishandle me. I’m signed to you, and you let everybody get in the way, and everybody break us apart. You didn’t protect me.”
However, the 32-year-old remains grateful to Pharrell for helping to jumpstart her career.
“I be basking in my blessings, and I will have moments when I just think, damn, no matter how I felt when I was younger, none of these doors would have ever opened for me if it wasn’t for P,” she said.
You can view the interview in its entirety below:
Taylor has come along way from being a vulnerable teenager. Since being signed to Star Trak, she’s gone on to produce good music as an artist signed to Good Music, the label started by the artist formerly known as Kanye West. Fans sang their praises for Taylor’s performances on her Last Rose Petal Farewell Tour. The multitalented entertainer has also acted in a number of films; the most recent A Thousand and One was released in theaters March 31.
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