Joey Badass accuses Delta Air Lines of breaking his recording equipment
Joey Badass is in the midst of a major tour, but if you let him tell it, Delta Airlines is doing its best to throw him off.
On Tuesday, the rapper and actor hopped off the plane in Portland, Ore., to discover his equipment had apparently been damaged midflight. While sharing footage of the studio rig on his Instagram story, he went off on Delta Air Lines, alleging that the external case had been removed and several of the knobs were broken.
“Yo Delta, what the f— is going on?” he asked. “You guys just messed up my whole studio rig, bro. First of all this s— had a whole case on it... y’all broke my f— knobs, do you know how much this cost? Y’all going to have to reimburse all of that.”
Joey Badass, “Teach Me” (Cinematic Music Group/Red).
“This is the second time y’all f— up one of my luggage pieces in the past month,” he continued. “Y’all broke my RIMOWA bag, still didn’t pay up on that. I’m a diamond medallion member, what is good with y’all?”
Joey, whose given name is Jo-Vaughn Virginie Scott, said there is $12,000 in damages.
“Delta teams will look into this described situation and reach out to the customer to address,” the airline told The Times in a statement.
In 2018, Joey had pledged his allegiance to Delta after accusing American Airlines of racial profiling. While putting his luggage into the reserved overhead compartment, he said a flight attendant told him he couldn’t put his bag there because it was for “first-class customers.”
“So I show her my ticket and the whole plane just laughs at her,” he wrote in a since-deleted tweet. “American Air is the best airline for racial discrimination. This is why I’m #teamdelta.”
But on Tuesday, he seemed to sing a different tune as the luggage mishap happened in the midst of his cross-country tour, which is set to touch down at the Novo in Los Angeles on July 28. On Friday, he’ll drop his long-awaited album “2000” — which arrives five years after his last album, “All-AmeriKKKan Bada$$,” and is a sequel to his breakthrough 2012 mixtape “1999.”
“Two Distant Strangers,” which won a historic Oscar for live-action short film Sunday, has been criticized for its depiction of Black death.
The new album was previously set to be released June 17, but the day before, Joey said on Twitter that he had to delay the release indefinitely due to “sample clearance issues.”
“Man I got some terrible news,” he tweeted. “My album won’t be coming out tonight due to sample clearance issues. Right now, it’s unclear how long I’ll have to postpone it but my hope is no more than 2 weeks. I wanted to have a new date before I told you guys but it’s out of my control.”
Just a few hours later, Drake would announce his surprise blockbuster album “Honestly, Nevermind,” leading many to believe Joey actually pushed his release back to avoid competing with one of the biggest names in music.
“Y’all thinking I pushed my album back because [of] Drake is comedy,” Joey tweeted. “Can’t say I ain’t happy tho hahaha.”
Joey’s acting career is in full swing too, including stints on “Mr. Robot,” “Grown-ish” and “Wu-Tang: An American Saga.” He is set to reprise his role as Unique in “Power Book III: Raising Kanan” when Season 2 premieres on Aug. 14.
The biggest entertainment stories
Get our big stories about Hollywood, film, television, music, arts, culture and more right in your inbox as soon as they publish.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
