Hip Hop Jewelers: The Biggest Scammers in Hip Hop

this video is brought to you by skillshare stay tuned to find out more was it was there a single purchase where you're like i can't believe i just spent that much money all day yeah or a credit card bill that you got when you're staring at that bill and going like i can't you know you i wish you got the most money that i wish i could give back jacob jacob jacob the jeweler man i didn't i spent over almost a million dollars with jacob over here how many of these watches have you know have these guys sold to people that didn't catch it like me or a little baby little baby wouldn't have caught it if he didn't instagram it right if he never instagrammed it he'd be sitting there with his forty dollar watch thinking it's worth half a million isn't it making a lot of noise man that's followed yo you just never heard you just never had a lot of chains on top of each other anybody any rep in the game they wear their chains on top of each other they gonna do like that i'm sorry i don't matter who it is from it's not real to you envy they're gonna do that anybody shouldn't know that they had you on that fake watchbusters.com yeah plenty of times but right now this is real though if there's any genre that has diamonds built into his dna it's hip hop since slick rick's early days of displaying decadence to the crazy creations that ghostface used to sport in the dawn of the bling area jewelry purchases are nothing new in the game in truth it's become such an accepted part of the culture that even before an emcee has truly accomplished anything the lure of the diamond district can be too strong to resist as kanye once famously put it on touch the sky i went to jacob an hour after i got my advance i just wanted to shine but while many of us once stared at these larger-than-life figures and assumed that every gram of diamond platinum and gold that they'd purchased was as legitimate as they come the darker underbelly of the jewelry game has gradually made its way to the surface at one stage the culture of flossing in hip-hop was previously thought to be on life support when in 2009 the wall street journal posted an expose on how the recession and changes in the music industry had melted rapper's ice and led them to look for cheaper alternatives a lot of these rappers simply don't have the money for the real stuff anymore proclaimed beverly hills jeweler jason arashimon said at the time it's to the point where they are wearing imitation jewelry and that's ridiculous but as platforms such as youtube and soundcloud became star factories and hip-hop ascended to the rank of the world's most popular genre fluxing your diamonds return with a vengeance and soon every rapper with even a regional hit was splashing out on signature pendants bust down diamond watches iced out grills and more and once again a new generation of impressionable hip hop lovers took their extravagant purchases and claims of massive spending sprees at face value but with the rise of social media these rappers purchases are under more scrutiny than ever before i'm getting on the stone bro [Applause] nah man come on where'd you get your jewelry from dog um and as it has become clear fakes are littered all over in today's marketplace in today's landscape jewelry like a label pendant piece are such important status symbols that there are even fake chains being made to allow struggle rappers to fake a cosign from their favorite crew such as little babies 4pf or 21 savage's slaughter gang but while these fakes were being sold on sites like ebay or alibaba there's a lot of proof that even if you think you're going somewhere trustworthy things are not always what they seem and now rappers are becoming more vigilant than ever stop buying all this jewelry without knowing what you're doing little dirk warned his fellow artists in september of this year a lot of the stuff fake and some is overpriced get one jeweler and stick to him i'm telling you y'all gonna be when the troop come out with counterfeits flooding the market a whole online subculture dedicated to detecting and exposing fakes has sprung up most notably ig account fake watchbusters has outed countless famous nmcs and athletes for sporting counterfeit goods just three days after derco's warning to upcoming rappers one of the most infamous examples of a rapper being finessed by jewelers came to light when little baby showed off the 400 000 patek philippe watch that he'd worn as a part of his mac galafit on instagram fans and fake watchbusters alike were quick to tell them that it wasn't the real deal within hours little baby plays rafaeluinko the outlet that sold him the timepiece on blast now at rafaello and co y'all know better than to sell me of all people a fake or anything that could be called a fake he wrote on instagram i stand on my name the same way y'all should ain't no such thing as a mistake when that money get involved suddenly faced with bad publicity the owners issued a statement which claimed that i personally would never knowingly sell him or anyone else anything that is not 100 authentic i have known little baby for a while and there is nothing fake about him especially his jewelry and watches i want to personally apologize to lil baby for what has transpired rafaella and colt took immediate action to rectify this we pride ourselves in being an honest business and will take great care to make sure nothing like this ever happens again but despite their assurances that this was a one-time oversight vlad tv suggested that this wasn't an isolated incident and detailed his own run-ins with arnco so i want to take a quick break to thank our friends at skillshare a unique service that enables creatives to turn their dreams into reality taking the knowledge and know-how to the general public skillshare offers thousands of classes that'll provide you with the tools to make headway with your chosen craft whether it be learning how to rap make beats or edit music videos skillshare has you covered in fact we leveled up by finding out how to mix this video's music with the legend young guru responsible for sculpting the sound of some of jay-z's most legendary tracks the famed engineer makes the secrets of the pros more accessible than ever before so what you waiting for the first 1000 people to use the link in my description will get a free trial of skillshare premium membership and access to their massive learning library head over to skillshare and start your journey now let's get back to the video i actually had a bad experience with the same company i had actually traded in a rose gold hublot king power watch you know we did a deal where i gave him that watch and he gave me a rolex presidential in yellow gold when i went to go get it appraised and looked at you know for my insurance and so forth we come to find out that one of the links on the back of it was rose gold instead of yellow gold and then we come to find out that the actual you know glass on the watch wasn't even rolex glass so i had to spend a few thousand dollars to get this watch back into its original shape how many of these watches have you know have these guys sold to people that didn't catch it like me or a little baby little baby wouldn't have caught it if he didn't instagram it right if he never instagrammed it he'd be sitting there with his 40 watch thinking it's worth half a million make no mistake rafael and co aren't the only culprits here in fact when you look at nearly every major outlet that hip-hop has helped popularize it has been accused of scamming to some degree since the early 2000s the world of hip-hop and jewelry have been closely intertwined and led a lot of salesmen to have personal relationships with the rappers and while for the famed jacob the jeweler who ended up doing two years in prison due to claims that he laundered money for the bmf crew it all ended disastrously for the most part they're making money hand over fist and in some cases doing it all with products that some claim aren't what they say they are among the most famous west coast jewelers ben baller the go-to guy for everyone from kanye to tyler the creator and nas was accused of being a scammer by dj academics and moreover act claimed he isn't the only one while you've prayed on the young black artists who've came up used overpriced jewelry by hundreds of thousands of dollars when they could have used that money to feed their family or done other things with it you've prayed only on rappers you don't prey on nobody else you're not over there trying to get the wall street because you only prey on african-american rappers who just got a big advance check what they think is theirs ben balder is nothing but a scammer a thief a liar someone who is just down to finesse them and i'll keep using my voice in my platform to let that be known these jewelers are the biggest scammers but you know what there's a lot of people who scamming the hip-hop so i ain't gonna say nothing until you start talking about me once you start talking about me i'll expose your scan where act didn't go into specifics about whether his wares were fake or not there are other figures in hip-hop who go out of their way to let the world know of what a jeweler is selling isn't what it claims to be in 2019 young thug claimed that icebox the famed jewelers in atlanta tried to extort him by giving him new pieces without asking for any money only to later send him a bill in a practice that he called predatory despite his prominence in the field another man whose name is not without controversy is elia eliante julius amigos and the creator of lil uzi's infamous 24 million dollar forehead diamond earlier this year he felt the wrath of sauce waka who claimed that the famous dealer was very much entrenched in the practice of selling cvd diamonds oh no you did not jump in my diamond business elena take you in the hot bb diamond scamming artist that's why the rest of them judas be on your carbon vaccinated cbd diamond center first of all let's just make this clear see i would take out my uh quavo and amiga that i i got i got a relationship with him like my brother you you been on my dm i might stay in my jurisdiction for four years and then i'll say don't you play these games we don't know why who's gonna put you in a little baby don't put you cause your diamonds is fake soon as they go to another jewel they put in that machine that x-ray machine they show you these are cbd diamonds carbon vaccinated diamonds rather than being alone in the allegations of this practice johnny dang otherwise known as tv johnny has since been dogged by claims that he did exactly the same thing by a former employee but where most of these claims have come from outside the industry there is one shadowy figure that's all too happy to let anyone know that's asking in on what goes down in the fake jewelry game known as raheem da julia he's since made a side hustle for himself exposing the ins and outs of how much money he makes on fake jewelry and in one case which rapper is purchasing it from him uh i've had a couple customers that i really don't want a name for it so you telling me that this knock off right here is a million dollar business yeah yeah a little bit more than that i mean i i i will say this i will say this is already out in the open my biggest customer last year was soldier board he bought the presidential with the black face with the white face he got the yacht-master with dealers such as raheem serving up fakes that are undetectable to the untrained eye the idea of cop effect jewelry has even become a topic of debate among ogs during a clubhouse discussion that was hosted by royce to five nine and sparked by the news that chatterjoe cinco had purchased fake watches to save money and why veteran manual discussed how the identity crisis that artists feel and the nature of the industry could pressurize them into purchasing fake jewelry while from crooked eyes vantage point the concept of rappers and athletes making the practice of buying cheaper alternatives known might actually promote good spending habits than those who look up to them you know what rice flesh bars as far as that it's like why even buy a replica watch and then say it's fake like you you're better off not buying it at all right but i understand the mentality to feel or look like or or or have to to to fit in like i want to act like this is a real auto mall i want to i want to act like this is a real uh paddock and you got the money to do it but you won't do it i just i don't i don't get that like you might as well just go straight back with nothing you know what i mean go get you a seiko or something like that do y'all think that that energy is transferring to the youth though like if somebody say yo i can afford this you know what i'm saying but i'll be wearing fake i'm wearing replicas you know i mean i'm spending less money is there a jewel in there for the youth in any of that energy can the youth pick pull out and say you know what maybe a bunch of jewelry ain't what i need to be on right now because my favorite football player he just said he ain't even wearing real jewelry considering that nearly every major broker in the game has at least one person claiming that they're pulling the wool over their clients eyes it seems like if a rapper of the statue of little baby can get caught out no one is safe whether it's a byproduct of the dangers of being ripped off or not it's unsurprising that there's a new crop of rappers who've decided that they should no longer value the flashiness of their financial security and shrewder investments case in point the formerly iced out 21 savage one is because everybody wears jerry i outgrew it got getting a little wiser and growing so another reason is because the richest people that i've ever met in my life they've never had on jury every time i meet somebody who's very very rich like wealthy i've never seen them with jireo and ever since i've been saving money and not spending it on jury i've been getting way richer and he's far from alone either recently when asked about why he doesn't own any cubing chains corday explained that the numbers just don't stack up in the way that many rappers seem to assume if you talk with any actual like accountant or person that like is an expert in finances they're gonna tell you okay how much money you really have to have to buy a hundred thousand dollar cuban to like really be able to like actually afford it in in a knowledgeable and in smart way they're gonna be like you need to have like 30 million we don't have a a 401k we don't have no retirement plan encouraging as their words are considering that the culture of showing off no matter the cost is still very much ingrained in hip-hop you can expect that most rappers will still be flocking to by what they hope is real jewelry for years to come so as long as staying iced out remains as much of a priority for mcs as it ever was you can bet that unless they take the time to root out the shady or dealers once and for all we'll be seeing more scandals over fake watches and cbd diamonds in the years to come

Channel: HipHopMadness

Views: 3,729,174

Keywords: lil baby, icebox, lil durk, migos, dababy, slick rick, lil uzi vert, lil uzi diamond, lil uzi diamond forehead, hip hop jewelry, ben baller, hip hop, rap, lil uzi vert diamond, icebox diamonds, hip hop music, hip hop watches, jewelry, lil uzi vert pink diamond, rapper, hip hop jewelry chain, hip hop madness, hiphopmadness, lil baby 400k watch, fakewatchbusta, soulja boy, soulja boy fake jewelry, Rafaello and Co, Rafaello & Co, fakewatchbuster, migos jewelry, Elliantte, lil uzi

Id: 5C1hDnzQDxE

Length: 13min 2sec (782 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 01 2021