6 Independent and Business Savvy Hip-Hop Labels
DTP is a hip hop record label and management company founded by Christopher “Ludacris” Bridges, his manager Chaka Zulu and Jeff Dixon. It is a subsidiary of Universal Music Group, and is distributed by Island Def Jam Music Group. Ludacris released his debut album Incognegro which sold 50,000 copies out of the trunk of his car. Ludacris and his partners founded Disturbing tha Peace in 2000 to serve as an outlet for musicians hailing from his native Atlanta. As fate would have it, Luda caught his big break that year when he signed to Def Jam’s newly established Southern rap subsidiary, Def Jam South, and became the label’s flagship Dirty South artist. In late 2000, Def Jam repackaged his debut album Incognegro as Back for the First Time. Though there have been a few artists on the DTP roster including Shawnna and Bobby V, Ludacris remains the mainstay of the label. In 2010, he released his seventh album, Battle of the Sexes, which debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200.
