How Amina Diop Helped Make Young Thug and Gucci Mane Stars

“Continuous effort, not strength or intelligence, is the key to unlocking your potential,” is a quote by Winston Churchill that Amina Diop started her morning with the day we spoke.

This is an everyday ritual for Diop—no not talking to me—but starting her day by waking up and reading an inspirational quote from an app. “It’s something to set the tone for the day,” Diop said. “It’s how I make it through.”

Finding sources of inspiration and then perseverance has helped Amina, who, for the past 20 years, has been one of the most influential behind the scenes women working in hip-hop. Coining her job title as “MakeItHappen.com,” she’s had her hand in every aspect of the industry from party promotion to being an A&R at Republic Records to managing careers of artists like Gucci Mane and Young Thug under her eponymous company, The Diop Agency.

Originally born in Manhattan and raised in Queens, Diop shares a legacy with other culture-shaping women in Black music like pioneering hip-hop mogul Sylvia Robinson, former vice president of A&R at Arista Records Drew Dixon, and recording executive Sylvia Rhone. Before she began working with Gucci, she managed the careers of video vixens like Buffie the Body, Rosa Acosta and Nicole "Hoopz" Alexander under her first management company, Melanzh Enterprises. In a lot of ways, that success arguably helped set the blueprint for the social media influencer business model that we see today.

“Sometimes people look for their path and what they’re destined to do,” Amina said. “But this job, this career, called me. It definitely wasn’t something intentional.”

A path in music manifested itself early. While attending Georgia State University, Diop was required to do an internship her junior year. One of her priorities? Doing something where she could have some fun, which led her to landing an internship at a record label called Spere Records, a subsidiary of Arista Records.

“I think LA Reid was still at Arista at the time and Spere was run by [Grammy award winning songwriter and producer] Shakespeare,” Diop said. “And after that I just stuck with it.” Now, decades later, she is a genuine power player in music and looking for avenues to expand her empire, with sports and movies potentially on the horizon.

In a conversation with Complex, Amina discusses what it means to lead from behind the scenes and shares her most exciting memories during her wide ranging career trajectory in the music industry.

What are some things that people misunderstand about the position you hold in music?

In the A&R space, you're the artist’s manager in the building. You have to be in contact with your artist first off, and your artist’s manager. You have to be in contact with commerce, digital product management, marketing, PR International, all of those things. You're the glue. You're also in the studio. You are contacting publishers trying to get beats. You are making sure that your artist is able to collab on features that they may want. I'm not currently doing A&R anymore, but I do think A&R reps are undervalued. It's a very hard and detailed job. On the personal management side, it's like it goes from one extreme to the next. You're interfacing with people's family, you're interfacing with the artists, you're interfacing with lawyers, you're interfacing with just every, every aspect of their life, literally.

How is living in New York and Atlanta have such major footprints and influences in the industry impacted not only your music tastes, but how you've approached your career?

New York is the cornerstone of hip-hop music and a lot of other music. The thing that I love about New York is you are exposed to so many different nationalities and cultures and foods and music. It's so rich in culture that it prepares you to live anywhere. I went from a big pond into a smaller pond—which was Atlanta when I moved here. I've been here over 20 years. The time that I came to Atlanta is right when the music was exploding. Outkast and Goodie Mob were already out and they had a strong foothold. And there was trap music. People Bankhead Bouncing and singing “Swing My Way.” In New York we didn't hear any of that stuff. Atlanta made me really excited about music because I was young and I grew up as an adult here. People were dancing in clubs. Like the 559 was still open. Bankhead was still Bankhead. It was just amazing.

I grew up in Atlanta and at that time I loved listening to the radio. But radio isn’t really as big as it used to be when it comes to breaking new music or new artists.

Unfortunately, the power of radio has shifted because of the streaming services. So radio is nowhere near the same. But Atlanta radio at that time, the late ‘90s, early 2000s was amazing. But now when you get in your car, or you get in your friend's car, people are ready to throw on the AUX and listen to your own playlist, or listen to a Rap Caviar playlist, or listen to a best of the ‘90s or ‘80s, or whatever it is that you listen to. You can curate your own soundtrack to your life now. I remember I had cassette tapes and Walkmans and CD players and stuff like that. Like, if I showed my daughter a CD, she'd be like, “What is this?” My son knows a little bit more, because the video games still have CDs. But even those are phasing out. Like you can download video games off of the game console. So the world has just changed.

With this shift in technology and how people consume music, how has that shifted or changed how you work with your artists when it comes to creating strategy or their music?

We're not necessarily chasing radio records anymore. You’re not looking for something to be a radio hit. Back in the day, people were more consumed with if this is going to be the top or be this week's most played song on the radio. But now, people want to be playlisted. So I think it gives the artist more freedom to create without the pressure of wondering will this song make the radio or is it radio friendly. Now more of the focus is on growing your fan base and creating a relationship with your fans has become more important.

I read that your management style is to let your artists be kind of authentic to themselves, and you try not to interfere too much. So how do you empower their creative autonomy and help them execute their vision?

I think I feel like management is like a marriage. So communication is key. Sometimes I may not agree if someone wants to lead with a certain record, but I play the backseat. I don’t say, “Oh, this song is not it.” Or try to chase something with a certain [ beats per minute]. They usually bring whatever they want to deliver. I've just been blessed to be surrounded by amazing creative talent. So there's not much to do on that end, but be supportive. “If this is what we're delivering, what date you want to go with? What are you thinking on the creative? What are you thinking for the video? What is this styling that you're thinking?” So it becomes super fun, because we can just be creative.

My artists have the vision, they have the plan. They know what their fans want to hear and what their fans like. So it's very easy for me to be there to support the vision and make it come to life. They might want to walk with some leopards in the Arctic. And I'm like, “Where the hell am I gonna get a snow leopard? But you know what? We’re gonna find it.”

You’ve worked with Gucci and Young Thug. How did you start working with both of these artists, and how have you built trust with them over the years?

For Young Thug, I was running YSL, so I worked with everyone on that team. I helped everyone in that camp but my focus was always Thug. And I met Thug through Gucci. And I met Gucci because at the time, when I started in the industry, I was managing models. I had a different company. It was called Melanzh Enterprises, and I managed video vixens like Buffie the Body, Rosa Acosta, Hoopz. I had the biggest girls in the game. At that time, I was casting for Flavor of Love.

I did the casting for Flavor of Love, Rock of Love, Real Chance of Love. All those love shows. The girls at that time were their own celebrity. This was before Instagram. All we had was MySpace. So I was casting music videos, and I would meet a lot of rappers. Gucci was one of the people that I came in contact with, and we built a friendship from there. Actually, we were just cool. I think he was in jail at the time and I wrote him a letter checking in on him. He was in between management and was like, “Hey it would be cool if you came on and be my assistant.” And the rest is history.

When it comes to video vixens, we don't really talk about the business side of it, but they're such an integral part of hip-hop history. How did you find an opportunity there?

When I was in college, I was working at a collection agency. I'd be the person calling you, like, "Excuse me, there's an attempt to collect the debt.” You know, those people. And with that put myself through college working 40-50 hours a week and going to school. And after my internships ended, I was throwing parties in Buckhead. Which I was terrible at, by the way. Being a party promoter—I take my hat off to anybody who can do that, because that is the most fickle business in the world. But I was doing party promotion, and at that time, email lists were big.

When you go to a club, promoters would try to get your email so they can shoot you emails for the next party. Also, what was happening at that time is people were hiring pretty girls to promote a brand. Heineken would have Heineken girls. Or Corona might have pretty girls in Corona shirts to get people to drink Heineken or Corona. So I saw that, like, OK, boom. I got girls to come outside and do the email list, because a guy is more apt to give or do anything for a pretty girl, right? So I was like,, “OK, hold on, this makes sense.”I took that concept, and started looking for girls to do the email list. And that segued into videos, because I had this list of models. So now I could cast videos. And at that time doing videos was real money. It wasn't like now where you can do a video and be on set for 12 hours and only get paid $250. It's not a lucrative business anymore, but at that time girls were getting paid $10,000 a day. Hype Williams was at his peak. Lil X, too. Back in the day videos were million dollar video shoots.

I remember Making the Video!

Right! It was a huge thing because we didn't have all this access now. You couldn't just watch it on your phone. People were still buying ringtones for their phones. You had to buy a screen saver and download it. So it's just like a light bulb went off for me. I met a guy named Van Silk. And Van was managing models. And a friend of mine called me because they knew I was working with girls, and was like I got this girl that I think y'all would work good together. Her name is Buffie.

Buffie was something that the rest of the world had never seen before. She's from Athens, Georgia. She had a 26 inch waist, and think 45 inch hips. And she was a dark skinned, chocolate girl, like it was a whole thing. So I started working with Buffie, and then it really exploded. Buffie was everywhere. Then I got with Hoopz. Hoopz was everywhere. There was so much money to be made at that time. They had calendars. They had DVDs. They had ringtones. And the ringtone deals would be massive! Because who didn't want a pretty girl on a phone? I made my first.. I Forgot I’m talking to the media [laughs].

Girl, it’s whatever you feel like sharing.

I made my first several zeroes, how about that. It was so much money to be made, but it was still like a hustle, because the girls would host parties too. I put together the first rider for girls to be at parties. The same way that artists have riders. You'd have to fly them out. Security. Everything. I made it so people treated the girls like the artists were being treated, basically. If you want to book her for a party and use her image, you have to pay a deposit. You have to send them a contract. And once you got the contract, you have 48 hours to make a deposit. You'd have to book the hotels and room through my travel agent just let them know, like, this is not an escort service, honey. We are coming to do a job just like you would book Gucci. I went all over the world with the girls. We went to Dubai, Amsterdam, every city in the United States. Even cities that I never heard of, like Texarkana, Arkansas. You go to Texarkana, and one side of the street says Texas, and the other side said Arkansas, and that's where Texarkana is, literally. That era was amazing, because if not for those girls, then it would be no like Kim Kardashian.

There’s a long lineage of Black women behind the scenes in rap and hip-hop. As a Black woman, how important is it to you to not only honor that legacy but also push it forward and pay it forward?

It's very important. In my opinion, women in our Black and brown society, we're head of household, right? You know your mom, everybody's mom, my mom. She's your protector, she's your business manager, she's your doctor, she's your lawyer, like she's your person. And I think that it's very important for women to have a voice and to be in positions of leadership, because we run our household and everything starts from home. I have two children of my own. Kids don't cry for their dad. They cry for their mom. I think that that translates in all facets of the world, in business and everything else. And women were silenced for so long, and now we have a voice and we're seen. We've broken the glass ceiling. When I will go into a building, I'm ecstatic to see Sylvia Rhone sitting at the head of Epic [Records]. That's how it should be. We should have a seat at the table. We are life givers. Like we bear life. We keep the world spinning.

What's something you look for when you're scoping out an artist who you think is ready for management or creative development?

It's inexplicable. I would like to explain it to you, but I can't. It's like an aura, you know, or a light, like superstars have. It's not even just an artist. I'm talking about an athlete. I don't care if it's an influencer, it's just something that they have. They get bigger in the room. They fill up space.

I remember the first time that I saw [Lil Uzi Vert]. I was like, “Who is that kid right there in that next studio room?” Thug and I were at the studio. I think we were at DJ Drama’s studio, Means Street. I told Thug, “Yo, you need to sign that kid. He’s amazing.” You know, that never happened, but they became like brothers. And Gucci introduced me to Thug. And let me stop and say this—because I need to say this—Gucci is the most talented A&R that I've ever met in my life. He can see talent like no one else. And I think it just kind of rubbed off on me. What he saw in Thug—like you have to remember, this is like 2012 2013. He was young Young Thug, literally.

When you saw him it was deceptive because you wouldn't know he had perfect pitch and he could harmonize like that. But Gucci knew. When Thug enters a room, he's bigger than life. He dressed different, he looked different. He spoke different. And we started working together later on in his career, but I always admired him as an artist and as a trendsetter and as just as a game changer. Both Thug and Gucci are unapologetically themselves.

Thug really bent the world to his will. I'm saying everybody 's jeans systematically got tighter. He literally changed fashion. Same thing with Uzi. He started wearing man bags and now every man got a bag. And I have a new artist, Untiljapan. He's amazing. He's 19 years old, and he has his own swag, his own style, super creative. He's an artist, like, literally, he can draw, and he brings that artistry to the music. And the kids are obsessed with him.

You’re working with so many great artists with your agency. What are some things that you envision for your company in the future?

I want to get into sports. I went from the models to the artists, and I think I want to move into sports. My son plays AAU basketball. His name is Amin. He's so cute. He's 10, and I've become a basketball mom, and I love it. And there's not enough Black women in that [space]. I don't know if I'd want to be an agent or maybe just a sports manager, but I want to investigate that.

My son might be my first client. I also want to get into film. And I have the Diop Foundation. I want to continue on that road doing philanthropic things for underserved and under privileged children, because I think that everything starts with at home. Something that our foundation will do is support music programs and art programs in schools in urban areas. I believe because if you learn how to read music it helps you cognitively in every other aspect of your life. Music is important to the soul and to our culture. It's just the ultimate way of expression. So I want to put the arts back into the school systems and community centers. Defunding [the arts] in our schools is the most stupid thing, I don't know why we do that. But that's really what I'm doing with all my philanthropic ventures, and really focus on that in the latter years of my career. My 10-year-old son only plays the recorder, but my 15-year-old daughter, Gia, plays the viola, piano and is starting with the electric guitar, because she's into strings. So I’m not just talking it. I’m living it.