The internet dictates a lot of the new superstars in music today. However, the problem is that people find all of it to be deeply inorganic and dishonest. Labels will push an artist at a rapid pace, and it becomes incredibly disorienting for fans. Consequently, new artists get labeled “industry plants” accordingly. Then, all of the love rising stars receive slowly wanes because they find everything to be fake. It puts artists like Doechii in a bad position, where people question the legitimacy of her music.
If nothing else, her label is firmly behind her, and they’re even defending her from all of the industry plant allegations. On a recent installment of the Joe Budden Podcast, Punch, president of Top Dawg Entertainment (TDE), made it a point to lay out Doechii’s career. How could she possibly be an industry plant if she laid out her entire journey online?
“You can trace back her whole thing,” Punch said of Doechii. “She was on YouTube saying, ‘I quit my job, I’m finna pursue this music thing.’ When I hear [industry plant allegations], it just make me realize that people don’t understand business. They misinterpreting certain things. If a label does their job, they considering that artist an industry plant.”
Doechii Is Far From an Industry Plant, According to Her Label President
Regardless of the misunderstandings of what an industry plant is, the “Denial Is A River” rapper has a full, earnest love for hip-hop as a genre and culture. In a February 2025 interview with The Cut, she trashed the people who view hip-hop as a lesser genre. “I’m gravitating towards the pure skill that was incorporated,” Doechii said. “Anyone who doesn’t think that hip-hop is an intellectual genre, I think that assumption is rooted in racism.”
Then, she highlighted Lauryn Hill’s classic debut album as a shining example of how meaningful hip-hop can be. “The feeling that I have when I listen to ‘The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill’ is the same feeling I want some other Black little girl to have when she listens to me,” Doechii added. “And in order for her to have that feeling, I have to talk about my feelings.”
Rapping also allows her to express her feelings in a variety of different ways. She told The Forty-Five that humor in her music makes it easier to express herself in ways she might not otherwise. “The art it comes from, the art of comedy, is about truth,” Doechii explained. “It’s about blunt truth and darkness and making light of it. I knew that I was going to be talking about such dark topics and such serious things and I was like, ‘How predictable would it be for me to talk about these things over a sad beat? Why not just do it in a Slick Rick type of children’s story way?’”
The post Is Doechii an Industry Plant? Her Label Certainly Doesn’t Think So appeared first on VICE.
