Jay-Z’s suit faults Kelly over tour

Rapper Jay-Z has answered R&B; singer R. Kelly’s $75-million lawsuit over their aborted joint tour last fall with a countersuit claiming that the tour came unhinged because of “R. Kelly’s financial woes, insecurities, and unsafe and unpredictable behavior.”

“In Chicago and Baltimore, R. Kelly was not ‘ready,’ ” the countersuit states. “In Cincinnati, Milwaukee and Hartford, R. Kelly was not ‘willing.’ In St. Louis and New York, R. Kelly was not ‘able.’ ”

The pairing of the rap star and the R&B; singer-songwriter-producer had been one of the most anticipated tours of the fall concert season, but it dissolved after Kelly walked off stage during a show at Madison Square Garden in New York, saying he had seen someone in the audience waving a gun at him.

Jay-Z continued the tour without Kelly as “Jay-Z & Friends,” tapping a variety of performers to fill Kelly’s spot. In response to the countersuit, Kelly spokesman Allan Mayer told MTV News that “Mr. Kelly will press on with his case and when the facts are fully laid out in court, it is Jay-Z who will be exposed for his wrongdoing.”

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Randy Lewis