On Saturday morning, the world saw a part of Fabolous’s life that for the most part, he’s been very successful at protecting: his life at home. We see Fab and his children at events like WWE Summer Slam, and photos of the family looking fashionable on Instagram, but the Brooklyn legend has been one of rap’s most private MCs.
On Saturday morning, TMZ released footage they obtained of Fab’s recent family discord at his New Jersey home. An irate Fab is seen shouting back and forth with the mother of his two children, former “Love and Hip-Hop” Star Emily B, and her father and brother, with an object in his hand. The footage begins midway through the verbal donnybrook and doesn’t show or give context to what happened before or after the minute-long video. Court documents do allege that Emily’s father and brother took two of Fab’s guns out of his house at Emily’s request.
On Wednesday, Fabolous turned himself into authorities after Emily told police he punched her seven times, knocking out her two teeth. Fab was charged with aggravated assault and making terroristic threats and given a court appearance ticket. He spent no time in jail.
On Saturday night, as his fans had a chance to digest what they saw earlier, Fabolous and Jadakiss began their “Freddy Vs Jason” concert at New York’s Terminal 5. On stage it was business as usual for Fabolous, who was the first of the two go on the stage during the “F Vs J Intro” from their 2017 joint album Friday On Elm Street.
Loso entered making an immediate fashion statement, wearing a vest that had depicted the cover of Public Enemy’s Fear Of a Black Planet album.
“Yeah, it’s getting spooky out here/All the Nino Browns done turned Pookie out here,” Fab rhymed. “No cool niggas, it’s just goofies out here/I mean, niggas is eating pork, wearing kufis out here.”
The venue was packed, and fans screamed for Fab as they would have at any other show. For many artists, the stage and studio are their sanctuaries for peace. Recording and performing give them a reprieve from whatever turmoil is going on with them personally. Besides the PE symbolism, Fabolous nor Jada didn’t address the elephant in the room.
At the end of the concert, it sounded like Fab was going to address the whirlwind in his life, but Jadakiss shouted over him to acknowledge the audience. Fab then simply thanked the fans for their support.
“I made it out tonight for y’all. I made sure I had to be here tonight for y’all,” Fab said. “I love y’all. Get home safe.”
For anyone to expecting Fabolous to get onstage and give some fire and brimstone speech about his arrest at home, it simply isn’t in his character. But his set list was also notably different on Saturday: Fab didn’t perform his hits like “Throw it in the Bag” or “Make Me Better,” his hits that are geared toward women audiences.
The ladies, however, stayed engaged with all the street records Fab and Jada paraded out. The duo did a mixture of their solo album joints, mixtape cuts and records off Friday on Elm Street. “Lituation” and “Ball Drop” came before Fab tagged out to Kiss for “Mighty D-Block (Two Guns Up),” “By Your Side” and his verse from Nas’ “Made You Look” Remix.
Freddy and Jason combined for “Theme Music” and ” Soul Food.” Styles P. came out and stood back to Back with Jada for “Banned From TV” and Lil Kim was Fab’s surprise guest. The Queen Bee gave a dose of her Rhymes from the “Quiet Storm” Remix and then her and Fabolous performed Kim’s new single “Spicy.”
The night’s capper was a love letter to the streets. Fab and Kiss gave a rare performance of one of their hardest collaborations, the Street gem “Hope” for Loso’s S.O.U.L. Tape 3.