Whitney Houston’s surviving family members are utterly repulsed that Pusha T would use images of the legendary singer’s drug-strewn bathroom as the cover for his new album Daytona.
Pusha hastened to name Kanye West as the person who paid $85K to license the 2006 image that shows drug paraphernalia and booze littering the bathroom counter of Houston’s former home in Atlanta.
The decision has enraged the Houston clan.
“Nobody in their right mind would do this, and to promote an album?” Whitney’s first cousin Damon Elliott told Bossip. “Is this what the music business has come to?”
Elliott renounced West and Pusha and denounced their decision to exploit a tragic and sensitive situation which forces the family to relive the circumstances that ultimately took the singer’s life. Houston, considered one of the greatest vocalists of all time, died on Feb. 11, 2012, on the eve of the Grammy Awards in Beverly Hills, California, from an apparent toxic cocktail of prescription and illicit narcotics. The coroner officially listed her death as coronary artery disease.
“I can’t describe how disgusted I am,” Elliott added.
Elliott, the son of iconic singer Dionne Warwick, is also a singer and producer. The Grammy Award-winning producer has worked with the creme de la creme of the music industry, including Destiny’s Child, Pink, and Bone Thugs In Harmony in a career that spans two decades. He told Bossip that he helped West get one of his first feature spots on Keyshia Cole’s album, which makes this latest move even more painful.
“He doesn’t realize what he’s doing to the babies – to the family – that’s the only reason I got really upset,” Elliott said.
As with much of popular culture, Elliott is deeply concerned about Kanye’s own mental stability and wonders if he will ever recover from the sunken place. The rapper and self-proclaimed hip hop genius famously suffered a breakdown during his last tour, became addicted to opiates, and was subsequently checked into a detoxification facility.
Elliott thinks Kanye needs to revisit the facility.
“I think Kanye needs to get checked in somewhere,” Elliott continued. “Addiction and mental illness are real, and you’re witnessing it at the highest point. And I’m not here to bash him, I’m just speaking truth. I can’t imagine that he would just do this for the publicity.”
Elliott is filled with feelings of embitterment and betrayal by West and Pusha T’s “exploitative” use of Houston’s low point to push their new music. He is both admonishing West and imploring him to reconsider his decision.
“I said it and I mean it, I want him to change the artwork,” Elliott said. “First of all, it’s none of his business. I know that it was a photo that was licensed, but who would do that?! It’s sick.”
