10 Things We Learned From L.A. Reid’s Juicy Tell-All

L.A. Reid‘s new tell-all book, Sing to Me, contains so many name-dropping details about the various stars he’s worked with — including Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Mariah Carey, Outkast, Jay Z — it can be head-spinning. But his music-industry saga started small, when he and Kenny “Babyface” Edmonds decided to start LaFace Records in Atlanta in the early Nineties. “It felt like a city full of dreamers, a place where things could happen and a place that hadn’t been born yet musically,” he writes. After loads of success and a few missteps (like losing his shot with Lady Gaga), it’s his Nineties heyday that remains vital to him. Toni Braxton’s album, Secrets, remains one of the producer’s favorites. (“It stays with me, one of the few of my records that I still play.”)  To get a taste of the man and the myth, here are 10 of the juiciest moments from the golden era of his epic career.

He let Pebbles poach Vanessa Williams’ song.
“I met with Vanessa alone in my apartment, where I was working, and I played her a song I had written and was preparing for her to record. That night at Galaxy Studios, Kenny played me another track he had recorded, and we wrote the lyrics and cut the demo of this new song we called ‘Girlfriend.’ … Vanessa was more than six months pregnant, so the timing could have been better, but they were going to pay $12,500 for the song. A couple of days later, Kenny and I went to Silverlake Studios to listen to Pebbles sing. … Kenny started talking about ‘Girlfriend.’ … When Pebbles heard the track, she wanted the song. She asked how much Vanessa Williams was paying us and offered us $18,000. ‘Plus I’ll throw in two cars.’ … Vanessa never spoke to me again.”