N.O.R.E. has shared a laugh with Akon over the fake watch the latter once gifted French Montana for his birthday.
“Are you ever going to give French a watch so he can stop telling this story?” N.O.R.E. asked the “Locked Up” rapper in a teaser for their upcoming Drink Champs interview that was posted to Instagram on Tuesday (July 11).
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“Listen, me and French got got that day,” Akon responded, revealing he purchased a watch for himself that same day, which also turned out to be a fake. “I’m the one that lost money. I bought two new watches — one for me and one for [French].”
“Here’s the thing: I didn’t know what a Hublot was. I just knew that I liked that. It was a nice watch. So, the dude was selling watches. And I said, ‘Yo, how much is that watch?’
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“He said, ‘Normally about $15,000 to $20,000. But I got a guy that can get it for us for $5,000,” he continued, before admitting he made the purchase on Canal Street — a popular street in New York City known for selling knockoff swag.
Watch Akon attempt to clear his name below:
Akon previously addressed his counterfeit gift during an interview with Real 92.3’s The Cruz Show last year, admitting he “wasn’t really a watch guy” and felt a way when French Montana informed him it was fake.
“Back then, Hublot weren’t really popular,” he explained. “I get the watch I put one on, [French] came, and [I] said, ‘I got something for you, bro.’ “He was happy, I was happy. We lit, we lit.
“Now, mind you, I’m not really knowing there’s specific brands [of] watches and all that, I wasn’t really a watch guy. I just saw something I liked that looked nice and I got it. French clearly went to his jeweler and got it checked out, and the jeweler was like, ‘Yo, this is fake.'”
“I was like, ‘What do you mean fake? The shit tick, don’t it? The shit work, right?'” Akon added, noting he felt slighted by Montana’s remarks. “Not only was I upset because I paid, like, five grand for each watch, in my mind that was expensive for a watch. But obviously for a Hublot that was no money, that was a huge discount. So I’m like, ‘This ungrateful- ass n-gga.'”
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In a separate interview with Drink Champs in 2021, the Coke Boys capo acknowledged that he understood how his “Hurt Somebody” collaborator was easily duped into buying counterfeit watches — and that he is still holding out for the real deal.