U-God Says RZA 'Is a Control Freak' in His Memoir 'Raw'

Wu-Tang Clan vet U-God goes into great detail about the rift between the group members, blaming the RZA’s “dictatorship” mentality for it.

According to an excerpt from U-God's memoir, RAW: My Journey Into the Wu-Tang (via Rolling Stone), U-God believes the in-fighting started when the RZA allowed his brother Mitchell “Divine” Diggs to manage Wu members and book shows. He alleges that money would come up missing and others complained about not receiving equal pay.

"Right now, it just looks like the Wu brothers are not on the same page, going at each other’s throats, missing shows, and all that," he writes. "But, to me, it’s really years of BS catching up to RZA. See, he put his family in charge of shit, and for years, we would go on the road but the money came up short."

In 2016, U-God filed a lawsuit against RZA and his brother, the group’s manager Mitchell “Divine” Diggs. U-God claimed that he hadn’t seen royalties from the group’s music since 2010..

Elsewhere in the book, U-God states that RZA also trademarked "the W" logo and prohibits any other Wu member to use it without paying a branding fee. "That to me is crazy — I mean, I understand if someone was using it without the group’s permission, but the members of the group itself? Wow, that’s just crazy," he writes.

"Now that the days of gold and platinum plaques had dried up, dudes started fighting over the W," he continues. "The whole foundation that we were built on and that made us powerful fell apart. We weren’t building anymore; we were destroying ourselves."

In the end, U-God says RZA is "a control freak" and his control extended into music as well, alleging that "he wanted to control budget, publishing, writing hooks, everything."

"Trying to exert too much control over grown-ass men leads to problems," he writes. "RZA doesn’t know how to let go and let motherfuckers be grown men anymore, like he used to back in the day."

"Somewhere along the way, he forgot to let his soldier do what he initially recruited us to do and coached us to do," he added. "He forgot that you don’t tear down your soldiers, you build your soldiers up. Because when they rise up, they bring you with them."

U-God's book, RAW: My Journey Into the Wu-Tang, is available now at bookstores and at Amazon.com.

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