Learning to Check Ourselves

Pushkin . In two thousand one, Tommy Motola, then the head of Sony Music Entertainment, called Murder Inc.'s Erv Gotti, who at the time was working with the likes of JZ, Ashanti and DMX. Tommy asked Gotti to do a remix of Jennifer Lopez's I'm Real, which became a huge radio hit and led to more remixes with JLO. In the world of hip hop and crossover pop and the early yachts, Erv Gotti was at the top of his game . And then admittedly, he messed up big time. In the latest season in Revision of History, Malcolm Gladwell is looking at the origins and consequences of mistakes, why we make them, the context in which we make them, and what happens after we make them. Here's a story of Godi's mistake and what it tells us not about the individual who makes the mistake, but the witnesses who watch it happen , enjoy the episode and find more Revisionist History wherever you get podcasts . This is an IHART podcast guaranteed human . 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And I said, What? He said, Make a record with Jay Lo and put Ja on it and make it a duet . And I say, Yo , I need total creative automatic. I'm doing whatever the fuck I want. Tommy was like, you could do whatever the fuck you want as long as it's a duet with Ja R uling Jalo. Matola wanted Godi to do a remix of I'm Real, a single off Jalo's second album. The first time around, it had been a generic ballad. Matola thought it could be reinvigorated. Gotti went to work and started to make a demo with J ule and Ashanti. I said, Yo, I got the record. I'm real . Him and his wife, Talia, come to the crack house, my studio and Soho . And it's funny because the freight elevator used to always go out . So him and Talia walked up six flights of stairs . He gets upstairs. He said this fucking wreck better be fucking good . So I play I play real film. Him and his wife go crazy. They're like, Oh my God, it was a one lesson. They listened and they was like, It's the biggest record . So he puts me on a private jet . I fly to LA , record the record with JLO. Next, you know, the record comes out. It's all over the radio. I'm talking about maybe a couple days after we recorded it. It's all over the radio . A few months later, i made another remix from Jalo's album, Ain't it Funny? The same thing happened . You don't even understand those records was colossal, not just in the States, on the planet Earth. I don't give a fuck if you went to Germany, Australia, Africa, that shit was in heavy rotation. Look, those were the two biggest wrecks. And for me to do, I'm real and instead fucking and ain't it funny. It was like at that point in my life I was like on top of the world. It was a feeling of invincibility. It was a feeling of I could do whatever the fuck I want to portray who I was at that moment, that's who I was. I'm from the hood. I'm making all of this money . I'm producing records for everybody. All of them are working and going number one and money's raining from the sky, I could do no wrong . It was at this point that Erv Godi made a mistake. My name is Malcolm Global. You're listening to revisionist history, my podcast about things overlooked and misunderstood. This is the third episode in our miniseries inspired by Michael Lynton and Josh Steiner's book from Mistakes to Meaning Where the auth ors sit down with a wide range of people and try to make sense of their biggest screw ups. One of their interviews was with Erf Goddi just before Gotti had a stroke and died at the age of fifty four. I listened to the interview and I found his story so moving that I asked Steiner and Linton if I could include it in this series because in his story I think is a really important lesson . Not about the person who makes the mistake , but about the people around the person who makes the mistake , the witnesses . Man, I grew up , oh man., I grew up Let me describe how it grows. I'm the youngest of eight kids. This is Godi talking to Linton Steiner about his childhood and growing up in Queens. We have no money. We live in a home. I sleep in the attic . You ever slept in the attic of a house ? In the summertime, there's no refuge. It's a hundred and change. You wake up every day you wake up in a puddle of sweat . Like that was my life. It was a lot of love. My family, the most loving family, but we had nothing . So when you talk about the shit you told me, I'm not I don't give a fuck, y'all . I'm getting money. Oh, I'm gonna I'm gonna get it . I'm gonna work my ass off and get it. I don't give a fuck what comes from it . He was blunt, reckless, ambitious , and hugely talented. His rise in the music world was swift . It was no accident that Matola called Gotti to work with Jennifer Lopez, then well on her way to becoming one of the biggest celebrities in America . And when the two of them met at Gotti's recording studio, God i from Queens, Jailer from the Bronx , they click . Just so you know what to expect, we're giving you the unfiltered Goddy . So I had like thirty hood negatives in the studio and in walks JLO and she was straight Jinny from the block. She had on some sweatpants and a tank top . And if I tell you she got in that studio and she had every one of my guys fall in love with her . She worked and talked with everybody and I was just like yos, she's so dope . You know what I'm saying? Because she could have been on I'm a big star boogey shit, but she was the total opposite . The biggest sex symbol, biggest superstar got on some sweatpants, her ass was looking fucking phenomenal . She worked, she literally worked the whole home . Like when she left, every guy was like, yo, she's dope. I think she liked me. I'm like, Yo dog. She worked with us yo. She worked the fucking room, but I thought it was so dope of her . And me and her specifically , yo, we hit it off. Riddy Medina, her manager , Benny Medina was like, Erv, you're gonna be like the Queensie Jones to her Michael Jackson. He was like, We're not doing nothing musically unless you're involved . A year later, Ellen Magazine decided to do a cover story on Jennifer Lopez . It was for their sex and body issue. June two thousand two headlined Big Letters Jalo on Fashion , That Song and Puffy Puffy referred to Puffy Combs, the infamous rap empressario who she'd just broken up with. And that song referred to ain't it funny because God i's reinterpretation of the song turned it into the story of someone coming out of a very problematic relationship . The writer asks her, Is that song about puffy? She says, No, it's not. Then the reporter calls Gotti, Jalo says, Ain't it funny isn't about puffy. What do you say? And God i says, Oh, it's absolutely about Puffy. And Jalo knows it. Here's the exact quote from the L magazine article , which by the way, is nearly impossible to find now. My producer had to get someone at the New York Public Library to unearth the issue from an offsite storage unit . I ain't gonna lie, we was thinking of effing with Puffy 'cause that's what the world wants to hear. And God i tells the reporter a story about running into Puffy before Ain't It Funny came out and playing him the demo. He says You know the four seasons on Dohaney in LA? I pull up and puffs out there with his security and I say puff , come listen to the new record I did with your old bitch. So boom, he gets in the car, so I'm blasting the record and when it gets to the second verse, he jumps out of the car screaming, Gotti, you bastard , this is the second verse. Listen you never had to be this way You should have never played the game you play seeing that you kind of lay situation He calls Jalo's ex boyfriend into his car and says, Come listen to the new record I just did with your old bitch . In a very public way, Godi was essentially saying, Jennifer Lopez wasn't being honest. He called her credibility into question. When I read it in L magazine Jaylo quote , those records are not about puff daddy end quote. It was it's the worst mistake I've ever made in my life because say that to say because JLO, Benny Medina , they were friends. They loved me . They loved me. Like I was a rider for them and I would do things for them that probably no one else could do and I would get done for them and she was my friend like why the fuck would I say that ? Why the fuck would I say that? But God he didn't stop there. He kept going . Right ? So I went on to say other damaging things like how would she know she didn't write the records? We made the records and wrote the records. She just did what we said . So she don't know who the fuck we were talking about . And yeah, we was talking about Diddy . And then I said some more damaging shit. I was like, guys like me, we didn't listen to J on's listen to JL's music. I made guys like me and listen to JL's music. I said before then we just hit the mute button and looked at our ass . Yeah i reflected on this with Michael Linton and Josh Steiner when they spoke . Wow. And you can pull all this up in the L magazine is there . Those are vivid quotes . Those are like supreme asshole quotes that wasn't warranted. And when I look back, I was like , what did you do to your friend So needless to say needless to say it ruined my relationship with JL . I apolog ized. I sent her candy and flowers and apologized a million times and I knew I was high . That's no excuse . You know what I'm saying? I apologize for us. And she accepted my apologies, but it forever damaged y'all relationship . Right. You know, superstars like JLo, they have a small circle of people who they could trust and I think I was in there for a second . And I totally ruined it . Right . So I'm an asshole . Well, you were in that moment . I'm totally in the wrong and I'm a complete idiot Make sure you say that that I said that I'm a complete idiot. She didn't warrant that. She didn't warrant nothing that I said . She was my friend . And why would I do that with the biggest star and most beautiful person ? Why would I do that with Jaylum? I just got back from an amazing family vacation in Northern California. It was the perfect reset for our busy lives. Now if you're planning on any upcoming trips, you could be listing your space on Airbnb. It's a smart, practical way to make use of your place while you're away and earn some extra cash at the same time. And with the co host network, you could hire a local cohost to handle everything like managing reservations, guest communication, and even styling your space. Find a co host at airbnb. com slash host. The future won't wait and neither should you . That's why American Public University offers master's programs designed for momentum , affordable, high quality, and flexible, so you keep moving forward. With career relevant programs in business, healthcare, education, IT, and more, you can gain skills you can use right away and the confidence to power your next move. American Public University made for what's next. Learn more at you. Being a small business owner isn't just a career, it's a calling. Chase for business knows how much heart and effort going to build ing something of your own. That's why they make your business growth their priority. The team at Chase takes the time to understand your mission, where you are now and where you want to go. Their broad range of solutions is designed with you in mind so you can bring your ideas to life. From banking to payment acceptance to credit cards, you can conveniently manage all your business finances all in one place with their digital tools. Looking for tips and advice, their online resources are always available to give you the solutions you need to help your business thrive. See how your business can get stronger and go farther with chase for business. Learn more at chase. com slash business . Chase for business, think more of what's yours. The chase mobile app is available for select mobile devices. Message and data rates may apply, JP Morgan Chase Bank NA member FDIC copyright twenty twenty six JP Morgan Chase and Company One of the themes we've tried to explore in this series is that mistakes have roots . They aren't random events, they come from somewhere. They arise out of a context , but the context often isn't obvious , not to those around the mistake maker, and often not even to the mistake maker themselves . In God y's case, the context was a telephone call he'd been on just before the reporter called. It was with a prominent music industry executive. God i asked that the man's name not be used, so we're going to bleep out every mention of his name. All you need to know is that the executive is white and God i was black . The two of them had an argument. One of God i's artists had played a part in a hit song and was in the music video but had been left out of the radio version, and God i was unhappy about it. So I was like, Yo, you kill him our artist . You got him on the video, but on radio , he's not there. It's sending like mixed signals . Why are you hurting me? Their argument got heated . The executive said it wasn't his fault. The decision was someone else's at his label, a black man. He was like I told that fat nigger not to not to put this out . But when he said the N word, oh, that's when I went crazy. Wow. What the fuck you say? I said, You just call Kori Vune and Nigger . I said , When this when this nigga see you, I'm gonna fuck you up . I said, How about that? And he was like, Irvin is and we arguing . But he said he used the N word on some racist shit. He said, I told that fat nigger not to put the wreck it out or put him on it . Yeah. But when he said nigga, I went that 's that's the anger . Yep I'm not a volatile person. I'm not a pop off I would describe myself as a cool guy level headed , but it's something about when a white person like uses the word negative to me oh I'm ready to kill because it's like you start thinking of all of the fucked up shit that black people been through and you got the audacity to say Niger in front of me , or I'm gonna show you a nigga now. You know what I'm saying? Like I used to always say like people would ask me how would you be able you would be able to operate in those times of racism ? And I always answer I would die . You know what I'm saying? Because yeah , I couldn't take the racism that would have been bestowed upon me . I would have killed me a couple white people and they would have hung me and killed me and my life would be over . I couldn't take them doing something to my mother or you know hanging my father and I'm living life now, you gonna have to kill me too . So these are the thoughts that's in my mind . Yeah . Have you experienced that before where you had white people say things which you have a lot of my white friends say, Yo, that's my nigger, but I'm not mad at that. Yeah , when they say that's my nigga, it's NIGG A . They said, yo, I told that fat nigga. That's NIGG ER. It's a big, big difference . Like I could I couldn't believe that he just used the N word to me . That's what made me so volatile . And it was so weird. It was like as soon as I hung up with the phone rang without . It wasn't like a five minute. It wasn't even like a five minute cool off period. No , hung up Yaood Ros Zell magazine . What the fuck y'all want ? I don't like saying hello. It's a little different . Can I ask so what do you think it was that Mate you you were just gonna lash out at anybody who showed up in that moment ? Yeah, within that five minutes, yeah, they was gonna get the exact same vibe. What the fuck you want? Yeah . He just who happened to was Gal magazine now one of my boys . Yeah . So I said, What the fuck want ? And he was like, Oh I see you . Like as soon as he heard that response , he immediately cut to the chase. He said, Oh, I'll just get right to it. You know , Jo said that the records come real and ain't it funny are not about Puff Daddy, her ex boyfriend . And I was like, what ? That bitches lying . This was Ervgotti's mistake. It changed his life. There was a version of the next twenty years where he could have been a creative partner with one of the biggest stars in the world. He had ideas for movies, collaborations. Jaylo was a once in a lifetime opportunity. That's why this was a mistake . It had consequences. But there was a point in God i's interview with Steiner and Linton that I couldn't get out of my mind. Listen , how quickly did you realize that you'd made a mistake ? I didn't realize quickly I was so angry and mad when I got off the phone with L magazine , I thought nothing of it . It hit me when they sent me the transcripts of what they was gonna pr a plate . How long after that was that ? Ah, a couple weeks or so, I would say . And when you read that, did you realize it right away ? Yeah, I was like, Don't prank that. But they was like, it's too but they were like, It's too late . Yeah. They loved it. They loved it . And they said it was too late . You know, I was trying to get them not to print it, but they weren't like, Hey, buddy, you said it. Yeah. Did you get any try to did you get any help to try to get them not to do it or did you just let it go? Let it go . I gave it my effort, but after my effort s let it go . He realized he'd made a mistake that in his anger at one person he had said something he didn't mean to another . And when he tried to prevent his mistake from having consequences from turning into a serious mistake , he was told, Hey buddy, you said it. It's too late. After Linton and Steiner's book came out, I interviewed them on stage at the ninety second Street Y in New York, and I brought up their chapter on Gaudi . So who's the villain of the story ? Not every story has type of villain. No, but tell me who the villain of the story is . So don't Michael, don't fall for this. Like this is okay. This is why he's so good. Wow. Don't fall for his trap. Like, okay, you can say not every single one. I got to keep the conversation going. I would argue it was the executive who used the N word. Josh, who's the villain of the story? Here's what I think. That guy acted terribly. There is no villain in the story. And I think an important piece of what we tried to describe is that there is n't always a villain . There isn't always some outside danger. There isn't always some consequence that has been derived from a villain. That these things are deep rooted in ourselves. And we're not villain ous. And so that aspect of our personality doesn't make us bad. This isn't a morality test . This is an opportunity to explore oneself and come to terms and acceptance of the fact that we're flawed and the way to get h,opefully, healthier and better is to talk about it. Who do you think the villain is? A man who has a very close relationship to the biggest rock star in the world , a relationship that has resulted in extraordinary commercial success is called by a reporter and is asked a question about that relationship and in the course of answering that question, the man says, Oh, she's a liar. Who's the villain in the story? You think it's Serve ? No. It's the reporter. But the reporter doesn't No, no, no, no, this is a crucial , crucial point , Michael. Okay. And I think this is because it's about when mistakes are made are made , and they are as deeply rooted as you suggest they are. They're not what you're the whole argument in the book is a mistake can come out in the spur of the moment, but it's not something that's coming out of the spur of the moment. It's something that has root s. Right. And what does that require of those who observe and are part of the process in which the mistake is played out? It requires some degree of grace and forgiveness and understanding. Yeah, right . So the reporter hears some Ervgotti say something that is completely out of place right? It makes the reason the reason that story so that story which you didn't what is an important detail is here is it goes it's all across the country. It's like it's huge. That's why it blows up so much. Everyone seizes on this her and longtime collaborator called Jalo a liar, right? If you are the reporter in that instance and someone says something they shouldn't say, your obligation is to say, wait, why did you say that? And if they can't give you a satisfactory answer, your obligation is not to use it. I'm sorry, it's not to use it. You're not you shouldn't you can't make someone the reporter turn that from a nothing into a destruction of someone's career because they had not the slightest concern for his well being or his reputation. And if they had an ounce of self understanding or of general understanding, they would have understood that he didn't mean to say that. They should at the very least have said, did you mean to say that , right? That's your responsibility. And the reporter failed in that fundamental why do people hate the press? Because in an interview like this where we could talk for three hours and you say one thing out of place because you have to be irritated about something else and a reporter runs with that one thing . That's malpractice. Why is this person getting a pass? That's terrible. I'm sorry, I'm really upset about this . I was upset about this , because you can't do this if you're a journalist. The whole profession works on an implied contract . Somebody grants you the gift of their time and attention and thoughts . They make themselves vulnerable . And in return, you pledge to respect that vulnerability. You're not a stenographer. You've entered for the duration of the interview into an intimate relationship and intimate relationships have rules . But then I went home after that interview at the Y after I had called the reporter a villain and a disgrace to our profession, and I realized I don't even know who this person is . And then I thought to myself Oops , now I've made a mistake. So I decided to track the reporter down down . That's after the break . I just got back from an amazing family vacation in Northern California. It was the perfect reset for our busy lives. Now if you're planning any upcoming trips, you could be listing your space on Airbnb. It's a smart, practical way to make use of your place while you're away and earn some extra cash at the same time. And with the cohost network, you could hire a local cohost to handle everything like managing reservations, guest communication, and even styling your space. Find a cohost at airbnb com dot slash host. The future won't wait and neither should you. That's why American Public University offers master's programs designed for momentum , affordable, high quality and flex ible, so you keep moving forward. With career relevant programs in business, healthcare, education, IT and more, you can gain skills you can use right away and the confidence to power your next move. American Public University Made for what's next . Learn more at you. ap us u Being a small business owner isn't just a career, it's a calling. Chase for business knows how much heart and effort go into building something of your own. That's why they make your business growth their priority. The team at Chase takes the time to understand your mission, where you are now and where you want to go. Their broad range of solut ions is designed with you in mind so you can bring your ideas to life. From banking to payment acceptance to credit cards, you can conveniently manage all your business finances all in one place with their digital tools. Looking for tip s and advice, their online resources are always available to give you the solutions you need to help your business thrive. See how your business can get stronger and go farther with chase for business. Learn more at chase. com slash business. Chase for business, think more of what's yours. The Chase Mobile app is available for select mobile devices. Message and data rates may apply, JP Morgan Chase Bank NA MBDIC copyright twenty twenty six M, JorganP Chase and Company . What do you remember about that interview It's funny you're asking this, something that no one's ever asked me , because I remember that interview quite well for a few reasons. This is Carter Harris . He wrote Leel Profile. He's now a screenwriter, teaches at NYU. And one of the reasons this article he wrote twenty five years ago sticks out is the reaction it got , particularly from Jalo and her manager Benny Medina. I actually remember being in a car with Benny Medina in Los Angeles and I can't remember why we were in a car, but But he was telling me how disappointed JLO was and he was because it seemed like a negative interview. It wasn't negative at all. From my perspective. At some point, his profile of Joayl completely disappeared from the inter net. And he always wondered if Jailo and her manager had something to do with it. Was Gotti upset during the call? Yes he was, Harris remembers. He seemed like he was in a state. He mentioned something about having just gotten off the phone with someone. He thought Harris