Sean Combs
Sean John Combs (born November 4, 1969) also known by his various stage names Puff Daddy, P. Diddy, Puffy, Diddy, Brother Love and B. Love, and is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, actor, record producer and entrepreneur born in New York City and was raised in Mount Vernon, New York. He worked as a talent director at Uptown Records before founding his label Bad Boy Entertainment in 1993. His debut album No Way Out (1997) has been certified seven times platinum and was followed by successful albums such as Forever (1999), The Saga Continues... (2001) and Press Play (2006). In 2009, Combs formed the musical group Diddy – Dirty Money and released the critically well-reviewed and commercially successful album Last Train to Paris (2010).
Combs has won three Grammy Awards and two MTV Video Music Awards and is the producer of MTV's Making the Band. In 2018, Forbes estimated his net worth at $825 million, making him the second-richest hip hop recording artist.
Early Life
Sean John Combs was born on November 4, 1969 in Manhattan's Harlem in New York City and was raised in Mount Vernon, New York. His mother, Janice (Smalls), was a model and teacher's assistant and his father, Melvin Earl Combs, served in the U.S. Air Force and was an associate of convicted New York drug dealer Frank Lucas. At age 33, Melvin was shot to death while sitting in his car on Central Park West, when Combs was 2 years old.
Combs graduated from the Roman Catholic Mount Saint Michael Academy in 1987. He played football for the academy and his team won a division title in 1986. Combs said that he was given the nickname Puff as a child, because he would "huff and puff" when he was angry.
Combs was a business major at Howard University but left after his sophomore year. In 2014, he returned to Howard University to receive an Honorary Doctorate in Humanities and deliver the University's 146th Commencement Address.
Career
Combs became an intern at New York's Uptown Records. While talent director at Uptown, he helped develop Jodeci and Mary J. Blige. In his college days Combs had a reputation for throwing parties, some of which attracted up to a thousand participants. In 1991, Combs promoted an AIDS fundraiser with Heavy D held at the City College of New York (CCNY) gymnasium, following a charity basketball game. The event was oversold, and a stampede occurred in which nine people died.
In 1993, after being fired from Uptown, Combs established his new label Bad Boy Entertainment as a joint venture with Arista Records, taking then-newcomer The Notorious B.I.G. with him.[17][18] Both The Notorious B.I.G. and Craig Mack quickly released hit singles, followed by successful LPs, particularly Notorious B.I.G.'s Ready to Die. Combs signed more acts to Bad Boy, including Carl Thomas, Faith Evans, 112, Total,[19] and Father MC. The Hitmen, his in-house production team, worked with Jodeci, Mary J. Blige, Usher, Lil' Kim, TLC, Mariah Carey, Boyz II Men, SWV, Aretha Franklin, and others. Mase and the Lox joined Bad Boy just as a widely publicized rivalry with the West Coast's Death Row Records was beginning. Combs and Notorious B.I.G. were criticized and parodied by Tupac Shakur and Suge Knight in songs and interviews during the mid-1990s. During 1994–1995, Combs produced several songs for TLC's CrazySexyCool, which finished the decade as number 25 on Billboard's list of top pop albums of the decade...
Personal life
Family Combs is the father of six children. His first child, Justin, was born in 1993 to his high-school sweetheart, designer Misa Hylton-Brim. Justin attends UCLA on a football scholarship. Combs had an on-again, off-again relationship with Kimberly Porter, which lasted from 1994 to July 2007. He raised Quincy (born 1991),[129] Porter's son from a previous relationship with singer/producer Al B. Sure. Together they had a son, Christian (born 1998) and twin daughters D'Lila Star and Jessie James (born December 21, 2006). Five months before the birth of his twins, his daughter Chance was born to Sarah Chapman. He took legal responsibility for Chance in October 2007.
Combs's sons Quincy and Justin both appeared on MTV's My Super Sweet 16. Combs threw Quincy a celebrity-studded party and gave him two cars as his 16th birthday present. For Justin's sixteenth birthday, Combs presented him with a $360,000 Maybach car, complete with chauffeur.
Combs owns a home in Alpine, New Jersey, which he purchased for a reported $7 million.
Sexual Assault Lawsuits
On November 16, 2023, Combs's ex girlfirend Casandra "Cassie" Ventura filed a $30 million sexual assault lawsuit against him, alleging that he subjected her to a decade-long “cycle of abuse, violence and sex trafficking.”[1] Cassie claimed that this included a 2018 rape after she tried to leave him, and multiple instances of domestic violence.[1] Combs's attorney has denied the allegation.[1] The lawsuit would be settled the day after it was filed.[2] However, at least two more sexual assault-related lawsuits would soon follow, which led to Combs stepping down as head of Revolt TV on November 28, 2023.[3]
Discography
- No Way Out (1997)
- Forever (1999)
- The Saga Continues... (2001)
- Press Play (2006)
- Last Train to Paris (2010)
- The Love Album: Off the Grid (2023)
Filmography
- Made (2001)
- Monster's Ball (2001)
- 2005 MTV Video Music Awards (2006)
- Seamless (2005)
- Carlito's Way: Rise to Power (2005)
- A Raisin in the Sun (2008)
- Get Him to the Greek (2010)
- I'm Still Here (2010)
- Draft Day (2014)
- Muppets Most Wanted (2014)
- Can't Stop, Won't Stop: A Bad Boy Story (2017)
- The Defiant Ones (2017)