About Teddy Riley, Babyface and the Failed Uncle Production

I have been laughing my whole ass off at the jokes about Teddy Riley and I don’t think this will stop being funny for a LONG TIME. Or ever. There are so many lessons here.

* This is a transcript of the video I posted.

Yesterday was the Uncle Production: the producer battle to end all battles: Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds vs. Teddy Riley. Our good uncles decided to get on live and do this battle and we were so excited, picking out #alphets and whatnots. Our hearts were just jumping out of our chest a this battle, brought to you by linen short sets with matching bucket hats.

First of all, a 30 minute soundcheck by Teddy. Uncle, for what? Why didn’t you soundcheck before this? What happened? That’s when I knew that Teddy was not prepared. Then they finally get Uncle Babyface on. First of all, Babyface is all chill and humble. He was like, “How’re you doing?” He even called Teddy “young man” because seniority. Meanwhile, Teddy was bringing his rubbish left and right. All Teddy Riley had to do was show up with a phone, maybe a speaker, and of course his work. That’s it. THAT IS ALL.

Nigerians like to call certain people ALASEJU (ah-lah-shay-joo), which means doer of too much. Simplicity is key. All this man needed was a phone. Instead, he had a full band, eight mics, a random hype man, four backup dancers and 15 people in the room and none of them could figure the sound out. No one person could figure out the sound. This dude wanted to do R&B Coachella for the gram and see what happens. See your life.

There’s many lessons for us to learn here today. One, you should probably be a little bit more humble, Teddy Riley. Not because you haven’t done anything magical; you’re a legend. Yes. But the way he just showed up, showboating and then Babyface slid in and was like, “How you doing? I’m here, you know, having done perfect music for four decades. I’m just going to come and social distance, okay? Because I just got over the Rona.”

Meanwhile, Teddy and his ragtag crew of ragamuffins just talking to each other and in each other’s ears with no mask in sight. Where’s the social distancing? That was the first part we should have thought about. We should have known Teddy wouldn’t be on much  good tonight because he wasn’t even social distancing, which is the most basic thing. This man was only supposed to show up with himself in front of a phone and music, and instead we get those shenanigans.

The good thing is the jokes that have come out of it are pure comedy. GOLD. If doing too much was a person, that’s Teddy Riley. All I know is, we were gifted. This was a gift. We thought we were going to get joy and come together through music. No, no. We’ve come together through the roast. The roasts of this man.

There’s many lessons here.

One, don’t do too much with the least. He just did the most with the least, had nothing to show for it. Baby face was like, “I’m tired of this. I’m going to bed.” I could tell he wouldn’t come back. Come back? In fact, I’m embarrassed by proxy. Me, I’m embarrassed by proxy. It’s like I’m embarrassed on behalf of Teddy Riley. I want to send baby face like a gift basket with vitamins in it so he can continue his recovery from the rona because his good and legendary time was wasted today.

It was wasted just by this enemy of progress. Teddy, why? It was unnecessary. Y’all could have gotten a millennial. One millennial. One of your kids could’ve just helped.

Bless it. I’m going to read some more jokes on Twitter because they are cracking me up.