T-Pain became synonymous with AutoTune while churning out hits in the mid-2000s and was taken aback when Jay-Z nuked the audio processor software with his “D.O.A. (Death of Auto-Tune)” single in 2009.
The Florida native joined T.I.’s Expeditiously podcast on Wednesday (June 24), where he recalled hearing Hov’s “D.O.A.” for the first time, which he said was “devastating.”
“That sucked,” T-Pain repeated. “I’m a Jay-Z fan still to this day. One of my favorite songs from him was ‘Can’t Knock the Hustle.’ And getting my hustle knocked wasn’t on my bingo card.”
He continued: “It was devastating at the time. That was another way of [Jay-Z saying], ‘Hey, man, y’all let me do what I’m doing. I’m still over here.’ It wasn’t a call to kill T-Pain. It was like, ‘Hey, guys. I’m still me now. I’m still Jay-Z. Y’all don’t get too caught up with that s–t over there. Ain’t going to last too long.'”
However, there’s no static between T-Pain and Hov as the two have spoken on numerous occasions over the years. The three-time Billboard Hot 100-topping artist explained that he eventually reached a point of maturity to understand Jay’s perspective.
“It just came down to me not understanding how to process somebody else’s feelings and looking at things from the other side and trying to see all sides of a situation before I was able to react,” he said.
“D.O.A.” arrived in June 2009 as a single heading into Jay’s The Blueprint 3. The No I.D.-produced track reached No. 24 on the Billboard Hot 100.
T-Pain’s use of AutoTune seeped into hip-hop’s mainstream, which was adopted by rap titans like Lil Wayne, who drenched his syrupy lyrics in AutoTune, as well as Ye (formerly Kanye West), who prominently used it on 2008’s 808s & Heartbreak.
Watch T-Pain’s interview with T.I. below. Talk about Jay-Z’s “D.O.A.” takes place just shy of the nine-minute mark.
