Pic by William Johnsen

A befitting title as Episode IV was the unofficial beginning as well. Just when it seemed like there was no chance of a Saigon release, our prayers have finally been answered…sort of. Atlantic Records have decided to release the Fort Knox yardfather from his contract after their irreconcible differences had both parties conducting business treadmill style — going nowhere.

In his Myspace blog, Saigon The Don breaks it down like it was a friendly game of baseball:

Strike 1

On one side of the token they’re telling me they need to market me to the youth yet they want me to use adult content.. This didn’t make sense to me. They wanted me to tell 12 and 13 year old kids that its cool to be strippers and gangbangers. I felt if they were going to market me to the young kids in the urban communities, I should be giving them something thats gonna be more beneficial than detrimental to their lives, like the importance of education, safe sex, will power and shit like that.

Strike 2

I like to tell myself that the money they were supposed to spend on my project just went to T.I’s legal team and court fees…Then I feel they did something good with the money..Haha

Strike 3

He [Just Blaze] gets the big homie Jay-Z on the remix of “Come On Baby” (see page to listen) and can you believe these muthafuckas stiiiiiiiiiiiilll didnt work the record or give us what we needed to work the record…

Wow. If his side of the story is indeed factual, this is a prime example on why Hip-Hop needs to take back the industry so that everybody’s best interests are in mind. There’s no excuse for Atlantic to stand behind Gotty’s favorite rapper and let someone like Sai fall to the wayside. Sorry Juelz, he’s what the game’s been missing. Someone who’s actually focusing on making good music as a marketing tool opposed to any other gimmick we’ve been exposed to this decade. Matthew Mundy told me he believes The Greatest Story Never Told will earn a 5 Cig rating from us. While that’s yet to be determined, one that’s for sure…

He’s off to one helluva start.

Saigon – Believe It (Feat. Red 5ive) b/w C’mon Baby Remix (Feat. Jay-Z & Swizz Beatz)