Young Thug is facing up to 120 years in prison if convicted on RICO charges. The rapper is believed by the prosecution to be founder and leader of YSL. His lawyer, Brian Steel, has fought tooth and nail to ensure that his client sees the light of day. Steel encountered the wrath of the legal system, however, on June 10. The lawyer confronted the prosecution and the judge over an alleged secret meeting that they had with an alleged Young Thug associate.
Steel took both parties to task over the alleged meeting, as the associate, Kenneth Copeland, is said to be a "star witness" in the case. "If that’s true, what this is is coercion," Steel said. "[As well as] witness intimidation, ex parte communications that we have a constitutional right to be present for." He cited an inside source. He refused, however, to name said source despite the demands of the judge. Young Thug's lawyer noted that an answer would violate attorney-client protections and "work product" privilege.
The judge tried to order an answer out of Steel by giving him an ultimatum. "I'm going to give you five minutes," he asserted. "If you don't tell me who it is, I'm going to put you in contempt." Steel, sticking by his word, responded: "I don't need five minutes." The lawyer was allowed to carry out the rest of his case but was taken into custody soon after. Steel will spend 10 weekends in jail. This means 20 consecutive days behind bars. Steel requested to spend these days in jail with Young Thug. If his bail is denied. Some 20 plus lawyers stood outside the courtroom to show their support for Steel.
Brian Steel has been adamant about Young Thug's innocence since day one. He told 11Alive's Neima Abdulahi he appalled by the rapper's legal treatment. "I've had the pleasure of defending Williams for approximately a decade. I know his family, I've defended him in courtrooms multiple times." Steel also noted, however, that Young Thug's musical persona does not reflect his real life. "It's an act. They are performers. They're performing all the time. Much like, I guess, professional wrestlers. We don't even know their real names. They're performing all the time."
Reneé Rapp is seen as a “huge inspiration” by SZA.
The 25-year-old artist performed SZA’s Good Days in the BBC Radio 1 Live Lounge, accompanied by two acoustic guitarists and a harp player. SZA, 35, was deeply moved by the rendition.
She posted a short video of the moment on Instagram Stories and wrote: “Renee is a HUGE inspiration, energy, voice spirit.”
During her chat with the BBC, Renee shared her thoughts about the track. She said: “I mean, I love SZA. I mean, she was one of my favorite artists in high school. And she's remained one of my favorite artists to this day. I think she's amazing. She's also, I mean, she's an incredible songwriter, but I think because she has so much swag. People don't realize how good of a singer she is. She's a fantastic vocalist and is really, really, really articulate. And I don't cover a lot of songs anymore. So I wanted to cover something that was, like, slightly challenging and also really vocally impressive, and frankly, hard for me to do.”
Renee is currently in the middle of promoting her second album, Bite Me, and opened up about how much more enjoyable it was to create compared to her first project.
She explained: “I mean, I feel like everything was incredibly different. I stopped listening to people that don't make music, because if you don't make music, then why the hell am I listening to you. And I also think the biggest difference, I think I just got a lot better. I think I have just become a better songwriter. I think I understand how to make pop music now in a way that I didn't really before. And I was very sure about what this album was and thematically, what it needed.
“So I felt like I was quite like, headstrong in like, what was gonna work and what wasn't. Because, nobody knows something better than yourself. I think a lot of things were different. I also just, like, had a lot of fun making it, like, I made it with like, three people, mostly, like, it was always like, four of us in the studio all the time, and we got so close, and some of us were already so close. So it was also just like a mess. It was such a mess, like we were just tweaking every day. It was so fun. And I don't think I enjoyed making the first one as much.”
