NEW YORK (AP): Ari Lennox was drunk on a plane as she headed to meet J Cole for the first time in 2016 to work on music the rapper had been putting together for Rihanna.
Lennox recalls: “I still had baby vodkas left from the plane. Definitely just throwing them back.”
Cole had been listening to Lennox’s music on SoundCloud for some time, and Ibrahim “Ib” Hamad, Cole’s longtime manager, thought it would be a good idea to bring Lennox along for the Rihanna sessions.
But Lennox had other plans - she was determined to get signed. They began working on a song called Facetime.
Months later, she became the first lady of Dreamville Records, and three years later, Facetime appears on Shea Butter Baby, Lennox’s critically acclaimed debut album, released in May.
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