TLC

Discography:

Ooh...On A TLC Tip (1990)

Crazysexycool (1994)

Fanm@il (1999)

TLC...The band that turned down such songs as Britney Spears' "Baby One More Time" and Whitney Houston's "It's Not Right But It's Okay" in favour of their own, because of the need for them to express themselves. In fact, "It's Not Right But It's Okay" was written specially for TLC and then adapted for Whitney when they turned it down. TLC have always been free-minded and self expressive and this came through on each of their three hit albums.
TLC began as T-Boz, Left Eye, and Crystal. It was, in fact, Crystal who introduced Tionne and Lisa, who clicked instantly and soon became best friends. However, Tionne and Lisa did not get on so well with Crystal. They put aside their differences and went in search of stardom. They were spotted by Perri 'Pebbles' Reid who auditioned them and had them signed as soon as she could, realising that TLC had the potential to be stars. Lisa Lopes had a very demanding father who expected nothing but the best from his children. All Lisa wanted was to make him proud of her. As soon as she heard that Perri was going to sign TLC onto Pebbitone Records (Perri's own label), Lisa could'nt wait to call her parents and share the good news. However, that night she got a call from her family telling her that her father had been shot in a disturbance with another family member. This crushed Lisa who had only ever wanted to provide for her family.

Perri introduced TLC to her husband, Antonio 'L.A.' Reid and his partner as head of LaFace Records, Kenneth 'Babyface' Edmonds. They began negotiating distibution deals, with Perri acting on behalf of TLC while Babyface & L.A. represented LaFace Records. However, Babyface & L.A. sensed the tension between Crystal and Tionne & Lisa and they insisted that Crystal had to go. Crystal left the group soon after, and was replaced by Rozonda Thomas, who was then christened Chilli, in order to keep their band name as TLC. As the relationship between TLC and Perri grew, they realised that Perri wasn't giving them enough freedom to manage their talent. Perri gave them contracts to sign and trusting her they signed them without reading the smallprint. Their relationship with their one time mentor had deteriorated in regret.

"She [Perri] wanted to control EVERYTHING." Lisa Lopes (speaking on "VH1's TLC Behind The Music")

TLC wanted to sign onto LaFace, however this was rendered impossible by the smallprint on the many contracts that TLC blindly signed. TLC then went crawling back to Perri to ask her to release them from the deal. She agreed and they signed onto LaFace Records. However, Perri was not at all happy about the split from Pebbitone, and in '95 Perri decided to sue both TLC and LaFace (her husbands' record company) for damages incurred. This was justified by LaFace 'enticing' TLC away from Pebbitone and TLC breaching their contract. Shortly after deciding to sue, Perri filed for divorce (surprise, surprise). However LaFace stuck with TLC and fought for them all the way. In June 1995 TLC filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. TLC ended up earning $50,000 per year for 1993 and 1994. They settled the case after 18 months and LaFace managed to buy all existing rights to TLC's work. TLC were now free.