#TheEyeisRight biography on Blaque (aka Blaque Ivory)

Members:
Shamari Fears-DeVoe (February 22nd, 1980)
Natina Tiawana Reed (October 28th, 1980 – October 26th, 2012)
Brandi Danielle Williams (October 5th, 1982)
Erica Pullins (N/A)

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                                                All born and raised in Detroit, Michigan, Natina and Shamari first met when they were both 10 years old in middle school. Both artists joined various groups together, one in specifically called Buutz. However, because Natina was raised in a strict religious household, her father pulled her from the group. Shamari, however, proceeded and later on joined another group called Hourglass, and met Brandi while in the group. The group later changed their named to Intrigue.Even though her father banned her from secular music, Natina still had the taste in her veins. It was all over when she moved to Atlanta  and met Lisa's brother, Ronald Lopes, back in 1996 while singing and rapping outside one day. Ronald started a company with a guy named Erick and called it Blaque House. They decided to work with Natina and introduced her to Lisa who became her mentor. They did some what Rico Wade and Ian Burke did Crystal for TLC - they decided that there should be a group based around Natina, and she knew just who to hit up: her home girl Shamari back from Detroit. Shamari talked to Natina over the phone about a third member and Shamari brought up her other home girl, Brandi. They called and asked Brandi and she was down as well. All three of them worked under Ronald and Erick until Ronald passed them onto Lisa, fully, becoming new artists under Left Eye Productions as BLAQUE (Believing in Life and Achieving a Quest for Unity in Everything). Lisa became their manager, mentor, and a big sister.

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                                                In 1997, Lisa got the girls their first music video cameo experience in her featured legendary music video “Not Tonight (Ladies Night Remix)” with Lil' Kim, Missy Elliott, Da Brat, and Angie Martinez. They come on just before Lisa's verse @1:23. They're also her back up dancers with Lisa's other friends, close peers, and family members during the dance scene wearing the Left Eye Productions gear. She also got Blaque, and her all male rap group Jena-Si-Qua, a deal with SONY/Columbia Records. Although Jena-Si-Qua didn't keep this bar, these girls did. While some of Lisa's artists stayed together at her house, or at Windy Hill Village, or other various areas, Blaque was staying with one of Lisa's idols, Lisa Bonet and her husband Lenny Kravitz while recording their first album. For their debut project, Blaque gained the assistance of Dallas Austin, R. Kelly (“808”), Mariah Carey and LL Cool J (“Don't Go Looking For Love”), and others. Blaque dropped their self-titled album June 1st 1999  under Columbia/Trackmaster Records. It was #23 on the Top Billboard R&B/Hip-Hop Albums and was certified Platinum by the RIAA. They released 4 singles:

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Their very first single “808”, penned by R. Kelly and Natina, went #8 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #4 on the R&B/Hip-Hop Singles charts, gave them a Soul Train Award nomination for Best R&B/Soul or Rap New Artist, and was certified gold. They shot their first music video to the single and Lisa made a cameo in it, stamping that these were her girls, and being a member of TLC, It's okay that they're style meshed.

 

Their second single,“I Do”, singly penned by Natina herself. Lisa made a rap for the song and used it for the music video where she made a guest appearance. This makes it the first and only song where Natina and Lisa are credited as writers. Also she recorded it again for the Trackmasters Remix of the song, and she guest appeared in the video as well. There's another version of the song where she recorded her rap for the third time. It didn't chart as well as "808", however, the music video gave them a MTV Video Award nomination for Best Editing in a Video.

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They released their third single, “Bring it All to Me”. It shot straight to #1 on the Rhythmic Top 40 and went #4 on the Billboard Top 100, and it gave them their first award, a Billboard Music Award, for Best New R&B Artist. They shot a music video for the song, without Lisa this time. However, Lisa's then boyfriend, Shawn Newman, played Shamari's love interest. The album version features JC Chasez from *NSYNC. The single features a remix with 50 Cent before he got shot.

 

Their fourth single, "Adore Me", is written by Natina and Japanese Artist, Tetsuya Komuro, who also produced the song. It's an exclusive Japanese release single and a bonus track on the Japanese edition of the album. There's no music video however.

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                                                The girls were making their rounds with public interviews, live TV performances, press conferences, etc. Also doing live tours; they were an opening act for *NSYNC's live in concert tour with Shanice, Britney Spears, and more. Lisa also had them opening for TLC in their FanMail Tour along with Vega, Destiny's Child, Xtina, and others. Blaque also did a '2 Hour Tour' special for Disney Channel in 2000. The girls were supposed to have their own world tour called 'Blaque World Tour' but things didn't take off as planned. However, the girls were actually taking well to the comparison to TLC. It was partly Lisa's motive in wanting to help boost Blaque and more groups like TLC (1 rapper, 2 singers), but with their own twists. Blaque made their first movie appearance, guest starring in the cheer leading movie 'Bring it On'; Shamari played Lava, Natina played Jenelope, and Brandi played LaFred. The movie starred Gabrielle Union and Kirsten Dunst. The group hopped on the soundtrack for the movie with their next hit track “As If” and shot a music video. At this point, however, it was pretty noticeable that drama between the group members were starting to arise really early as Blaque showed up the premier of the 'Bring it On' movie without Natina, who showed up to the event solo in a totally different outfit. It was also rumored that two also were doing shows without Natina and pleaded for a new member to replace her. None of the girls spoke forward of any of the mess that was happening between them. However, they just proceeded... They also featured on Jagged Edge's track “You Can Always Go” for the 'Big Momma' movie soundtrack. The group made another cameo on Ludacris' video “Welcome to Atlanta”, made an appearance in the very first episode of the show V.I.P., they joined the “What's Going On?” track for the 'What's Going On: All-Star Tribute' album with Artist Against AIDS Worldwide, and also featured on Lisa's solo album, 'Supernova', on a song called “Head to the Sky”. Each girl started branching out solo as well. Shamari made a special feature with Wanya Morris (Boyz II Men) on Lisa's track “Tampered With” for her album 'Supernova' as well, but only got on her 'The Block Party' single. She worked with Bell Biv DeVoe on their song “Da Hot Shit (Aight)” with Shaheed “The Poster Boy” and Jak Frawst for their third album, 'BBD'. She did the video with them, making it her first solo music video appearance.

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                                                Before the time Lisa gave birth to N.I.N.A. under Tha Row, Natina got engaged to Lisa's future label mate, Kurupt, and appeared with him on his track “It's Over” for his third studio album, 'Space Boogie: Smoke Oddessey' and they shot a video together, making Natina's first (and last) solo music video appearance. They shot the video at the very last location TLC shot a music video with Lisa for Goodie Mob's "What it Ain't (Ghetto Enuff)" music video. Apparently female rapper Foxy Brown took it as a diss to her being that she was with Kurupt before Natina. She followed up with a diss record towards her called "7:30". Natina responded to it in an interview:

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"Some hos is always yappin', especially pop-star bitches with the soft image. You can't chase something that doesn't chase you back. I don't spend a lot of time thinking about what people think about me. It's petty. It's like people never grow up in this game. You watch Biggie and all that shit that [he] and Pac went through, and people still don't get the message. They still want to start the wars and create fires."

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                                                Even though Blaque hopped on the 'On the Line' movie soundtrack with “Can't Trust Myself”(allegedly was supposed to be on their sophomore album, but didn't make the final cut), Brandi makes an appearance in the movie as Brandy. As time went, Lisa started paying more attention to how Natina was working in the group and heavily admired her drive and creativity, reminded her of herself in TLC. Instead of being jealous and doing what some of her managers, producers, labels, etc. did to her, she showed love, respect, admiration, and gave Natina more room to be the creative individual she was. It also surfaced that extended family members of the group started making it big as well. Natina's cousin, Farrah Franklin, joined Destiny's Child for a bit (also made a cameo in the "It's Over" music video) and Brandi's relative, allegedly, Kiely Williams, started blowing up in the group 3LW, which started off similar to TLC as well. Lisa gave them the thumbs up too. All of this was going on while Blaque was back in the studio to record their 2002 sophomore album, 'Blaque Out!'. Some fans wondered why it took so long for Blaque to start working on a second album. Natina stated that besides having "technical difficulties", but Brandi's mother died before the making of the album. So some of the time off was for grievances purposes, but did make their way to started the process of their next project.

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                                                Blaque finished recording their sophomore album 'Blaque Out!. The album was previously titled 'Dare to Dream', however, another artist already used it first. They started working on the album with Salaam Remi (The Block Party), Full Force (House Party), Dallas Austin, and Kevin “Shekspere” Briggs (who produced their song "Release Me" and TLC's song "No Scrubs"). Lisa was not listed as a executive producer this time. However, it was said that she did  help out with the album in some other ways.They recorded 31 songs for the album, but the girls only liked 16 of the songs. Even though Tommy Mottola only wanted to have 10 or 12 songs, Natina stated they were going to push for 13 songs, and that's what they got. There's a song called "Peepin' Tom" that didn't make a cut. It was alleged that they did a song with Lisa called "Balla Girls" as well as some other songs with Ludacris and maybe Allen Iverson. At this point, Blaque had their new sound, an evolved image, did a photo shoot, got their album cover., and, allegedly, aimed to do a "Blaque Out! World Tour". They chosen the first single, originally "Blaque Out" but “Can't Get it Back” was chosen otherwise. The video was shot on October 16 and 17 in Los Angeles by Liz Friedlander, allegedly the making of the video was supposed to be on"MTV: Making the Video", but it never happened. One of Blaque's fansite 'Blaque Club House' stated the video went like this:

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"Can't Get it Back is Here! The video was shot on October 16 and 17 in Los Angeles by Liz Friedlander and will premeire on November 5th on all video channels! What's the video about? Well, Blaque literally goes back in time to resolve their heartache from there boyfriends. Shamari, Natina, and Brandi all have separate apartments and they go on a tantrum fit, ripping down pictures and discarding mementos. After the destruction, the ladies meet up and go out to have a good time!"

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                                                Natina was pregnant with her and Kurupt's son, Tren Brown,. It was beautiful thing for Natina, but not that great for the group as it could potentially hurt the promo for the album. The album kept getting pushed back 4 times from Oct 16th, 2001 and before getting the official release date of January 29th, 2002."Can't Get it Back" only charted at #91 on Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Song due to lack of promotion. ​The album also had leaked online around when it started getting pushed back. Besides Natina being pregnant, the push back of the release date of the album, and the album leaking, the release date of the album passed and the album still wasn't in stores. Fans were confused because Blque was very quiet. However, Lisa was very active on her website Eyenetics.net. Fans asked her what happened, and this is what she had to say:

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"BLAQUE WAS DROPPED FROM COLUMBIA FOR REASONS UNKOWN. THEY FULLY COMPLETED THEIR ALBUM, RELEASED THEIR FIRST SINGLE TO RADIO AND DID ADS FOR THEIR UPCOMING RELEASE. IT LOOKS AS IF TRACEY EDMONDS (BABYFACE'S WIFE) IS GOING TO SIGN THE GROUP AND RECORD A COUPLE NEW SONGS. THIS NOT WRITTEN IN STONE AS OF YET. GOOD LUCK TO BLAQUE! - 02/02"

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                                                Before you think it's shady, know that they all still had love for each other and was there for one another. During her pregnancy, Natina stayed with Lisa & Suge Knight when they were together the last three months of her pregnancy. Natina even had her baby shower at Lisa's home. Living there Lisa and Natina came up with a plan to take over Tha Row records as the Queen NINA and Princess Natina of the label. Lisa was even named the God Mother of Tren. It was that Lisa had already moved on to another girl group named Ejypt and focused on her other acts that were trying to get where Blaque had gotten now. Lisa's brother, Ronald Lopes, weighed in on the situation as well:

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 "If you wanna know whats been up, they got dropped from Sony and then Natina set up a meeting with Pebbles (ironic isnt it?!) Now they are supposed to sign with DreamWorks. They are gonna keep like six of their songs and record some new ones."  

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                                                 Even though Blaque denied this being the reason (and showed a large amount of respect for Destiny's Child), some fans speculate Matthew Knowles had a hand in this being he had a roll in the company and Destiny's Child being one of their label mates. Columbia shelved both the music video for "Can't Get it Back" and the 'Blaque Out!' album. “Can't Get it Back” was re-recorded by another female group called Mis-Teeq under Telstar/Reprise Records for their second album, 'Eye Candy'. Natina's rap was re-written as well. Allegedly, the girls were going to go to Def Jam Records with the album and make the first single "Know What's Up", shooting a video for the song in April of 2002, redoing the promotional process for the album, but that never happened. Also allegedly they were going to go to Arista Records where TLC was. Still, nothing happened.

 

                                                Unfortunately, during this rough point in Blaque's career, Blaque was revealed with sad news that Lisa had passed away while in Honduras with Ejypt and many others. This was after the birth of Natina's son. After turning down DreamWorks and Jive Records, Blaque teamed up with Darkchild to re-produce the album but under Cash Money Records until Missy Elliott decided to take over as Blaque's new manager in Lisa's honor. Knowing those were her girls and truly wanted to help them out. Missy got the girls signed with her to Elektra Records instead with Darkchild still in the picture and helped them work on 'Torch', which is supposed to be a redo of 'Blaque Out!' as their second album (but technically their third now). They re-did the previous album titled track “Blaque Out”, featured Lord Tarid & Peter Gunz. They also made a tribute song to Lisa titled “Her Name”. They were going to release “Ugly” featuring Missy Elliott as the first single. Even though it started getting radio play, they decided to not release it first. “No Ganksta” was an option, a response to 50 Cent's hit song “Wanksta”. It was already garnering underground recognition, but since radio didn't pick it up fast enough. “I'm Good” was released as a single. Missy got the girls a spot in another movie called 'Honey', showcasing their new single and banging music video, bringing them back further into circulation. “Ugly” became the first single. After the album was finished, it was set to be released May 2004, but was shelved. Even though the girls were handed top-notch producers and songwriters, 'Torch' wasn't BLAQUE enough to the group. To them, it was made more in the eyes of Elektra and not in their favor. Some fans suspected foul play from Matthew Knowles again though the girls denied that also. They said as well that the label was transitioning into Universal Motown. According to Brandi, the new label executive made the decision to drop the girls along with other acts from the label. This was around the time that Natina left the group and go back to Gospel music.

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                                                In 2004, Natina left the group to go to the Ministries and do Gospel music again like when she was younger. Although Shamari signed with DARKCHILD, making plans to release a solo album (dropping snippets to her songs "NJ2"and "The One" that was later given to Megan Rochell, re-titled "The One You Need"), the group still prospered. Both replaced Natina with Erica Pullins for a short period of time while doing shows with Erica rapping all of Natina's raps. Erica started recording music with them too until she felt the group wasn't going anywhere anymore, and left back home to Chicago. She's now a solo artist and goes by the name Erica P with a YouTube page full of solo work and interview. Shamari and Brandi asked Natina to come back, and Natina felt it was time. They got signed with Geffen Records and Family Over Everything Entertainment to start working redoing 'Torch', calling this album their third album (when technically now it's their fourth), and also a compilation album with Some Special Markets from 2005 to 2009, either one was going to be titled 'Beauty'. They ended up naming the album 'Private Show' and the compilation album 'Blaque By Popular Demand'. T-Boz started mentoring them. They recorded another Lisa tribute song for the album called “Storm”, written by T-Boz who did background vocals as well, to follow up to the release of the 'Last Days of Left Eye' documentary. They also started recording a reality TV show called 'Blaque in the House' with many celebrity appearances including Lil' Mama, Da Brat, Chris Tucker, T-Boz, Ronnie DeVoe of Bell Biv DeVoe & New Edition, Kurupt, and others as Blaque record the process of their next album and the era to come. They were going to use T-Boz's house to film the show. A promo clip was released online for their fans, but the show never saw a release. “Blue Jeans”, “All Nighter”, and “High Definition” were either leaked or released over time, no singles released yet however. 

 

                                                During the process of their next album, Blaque started doing some reevaluation, and decided to pause on the album due to all that was going on in their personal lives. Shamari put her solo music on hold as well, got married to Ronnie DeVoe, started her own Spa business, and made plans to go to college to get a Bachelor's degree. Brandi was engaged to be married and started perusing in a solo career. She started her own production company called Tune Town Productions, was shopping around her solo music, and started going under a new name, Brandi D (her middle name, Danielle). She has an non-credited feature in Nelly's 2005 monster hit single “Grillz”, but got her recognition by him putting her in his video. Natina starred in an unknown play, wanting to start participating more in films. She featured in the ABC movie 'Innocent Victim”, and wanted to enjoy her family more. The group wanted to keep going for the fans and keep the dream they had from the beginning alive, but they felt their head wasn't in the game anymore, and soared into a hiatus. 'Torch' reemerged, however, anticipating on an iTunes release, but was once again shelved. In 2011, Brandi released her first solo single, “Love it”, for her debut album, 'The Real Brandi D.'. Piper helped produced this smooth and sexy tune, but just like the other projects, the album was never released. September 2012, Blaque decided to reunite again and perform at the 1st annual Left Eye Music Festival. Not only did they reunite, but they met up with old members of Left Eye Productions back in the day, including Lisa's other old protege, Nandi, who co-wrote on their song “Head to the Sky”. The girls finally decided they were ready to record again for the fourth album. Nandi decided to become their new manager. They re-grouped and started working on 'Private Show' again.

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                                                One night, in Lawrenceville, GA, on October 26th, changed the face of everything Blaque and Natina. Natina was on her way home from a local market, on the phone while crossing a highway and was unexpectedly hit by a car being furiously driven by a mildly intoxicated couple. They stopped the car, performed CPR on her, and rushed her to a near by medical center, but she died on the way there. She was 32, going to be 33 in 2 days on October 28th. No charges were filed. She's buried in North Atlanta Memorial Park in Doraville, GA. Grieving with family, friends, and fans, Blaque paused the album again after singing at her funeral until months after “Cut You Off” from the album leaked out. In 2013, Brandi and Shamari began to stand in the exact same position T-Boz and Chilli were in 11 years previously when Lisa passed, doing promotional interviews and performances, trying to finish their fourth album with the work Natina left behind while still recording. They finally dropped an official release late Summer of 2013 titled “Summertime Ridin'”. This was their first officially released track since Natina's passing, without her vocals as well, and the fans really took to the song, but really started to feel Natina's absence. That next year, they released another song called “Today”, a tribute to Natina. They held a remembering/birthday party for her also, celebrating her life. They decided to try doing a series again, filming their album process, but via YouTube. They released only one episode, previewing music they were recording and having a listening party. Ronald Lopes makes an appearance. Another episode has not been released. At this point, Brandi was no longer engaged, enjoying her life as a single woman. She's also helping her baby sister, Kodie Shane, coaching her after she got signed to Epic Records as a female rapper. Shamari is still enjoying her marriage with Ronnie that's going on +10 years strong! She also graduated from Georgia University with a bachelor's degree. They revealed the album is finally finished, but no release date yet.

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                                               The girls however also have came back together for Blaque, creating Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook pages for the group. They were also supposed to finally perform their song "Storm" at Lisa's 45th Birthday celebration in 2016, but Shamari couldn't make it. All their music is even up on iTunes, including 'Blaque Out!' internationally, with a new cover and original track list. The album did get a release years before hand, but with a different track list including "As If" as an album track and a new song "He Said, She Said". "Can't Get it Back" was replaced with the Trackmaster Remix of the song because it was no longer theirs to keep, legally. The album was snatched off of iTunes immediately some time after, but brought back in the old fashion, removing "He Said, She Said", but keeping the Trackmaster Remix of "Can't Get it Back". Fans ahve asked the girls, to this day, is 'Torch' being released anytime soon, and they repeat "Stay tuned", but still, nothing has released. A petition from fans, demanding the album to see a release, has been made. You can find it on our home page. Other then that, they were seen hanging around a lot with Lisa's other girl group, Ejypt, at one point. They've been posting photos and videos together on their Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter accounts either hanging together, having fun, or singing together. There's even an Instagram page they have called BlaquEjypt with exclusive Ejypt footage. Katrina from Ejypt has even been doing Shamari's new hair styles recently, and have been sharing them via her Instagram page @KattsHair. It's not clear if Ejypt have been working on new music with Blaque or not. Brandi has also been modeling and just announced being Brand Ambassador at Yummi Candi Collections, sporting Yummi Candi Wigs. She also found love in a new man, a rapper named Memphis Moe, who she's now engaged to. Shamari is still enjoying her life as a married woman.  She was also apart of a cover band at some point. Her husband Ronnie got a movie made after him and the other members of New Edition called 'The New Edition Story'. Keith Powers played Ronnie and Rachel Currance played Shamari. She announced her pregnancy after and gave birth to two twins in 2017, 2 baby boys named Ronnie and Romey. Even though Blaque had fell under the radar again after her pregnancy, and both being apart of cover bands, the now duo started performing again, looking for bookings as we speak. If you want Blaque to come to your city, please email OfficialBlaque@gmail.com. Also, Shamari is now apart of the hit reality TV series 'Real Housewives of Atlanta', and is planning on releasing a single with her husband called "Love Comes Through". They released the 'Blaque Out!' leftover track "He Say, She Say" as a single as well. After 15 years, Blaque has finally released 'Torch' on their 20th anniversary of being in the industry, and the 20th anniversary of 'Blaque'. Now all 3 of their final projects with Natina have been released to the world as 'Private Show' remains unreleased

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Facebook:
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"A message to Blaque from us, we the fans will always stick behind you 100%

as long as you keep giving us great music!

Much luv!"

- The Blaque Website

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Check out the NEW Blaque fan page Blaque Squad.