Never one to mince words, Ice Cube responded to the death of his former music manager, Jerry Heller, during an interview with Detroit’s Hot 107.5 last weekend without a drop of sentimentality: “I didn’t have no emotions, you know.” Heller died after having a heart attack while driving last Friday, he was 75. Ice Cube told the radio station:
I ain’t goin’ pop no champagne, but I ain’t goin’ shed no tears either. It is what it is, you know. We come here to pass, and he’s outta here, so you know. Like I said, I’m not losing no sleep over that one.
As a music-industry veteran, Heller helped play a part in bringing N.W.A into the spotlight in the late ’80s, but disputes over money caused a riff between Heller and Ice Cube in 1989 and then with Dr. Dre in ’91. Their sour relationship was brought back into the spotlight last year when Paul Giamatti’s less-than-favorable portrayal of Heller in the 2015 N.W.A biopic Straight Outta Compton led the manager to file a lawsuit against the production company — which include Cube and Dre — seeking $110 million for defamation. A judge dismissed most of the lawsuit in June 2016.
