Musician Kanye West changed all that when he went to Twitter to complain about his many contracts with the recording industry. Normally, its sort of reversed. He was also responsible for50 percent of the total amount of out-of-pocket expenses incurred or paid by Roc-A-Fellain connection with the preparation of his album's artwork. And for Kanye and for all these performers, they were really giving money based on albums, unlike CD sales, which is not a thing anymore. Kanye's call for transparency in the music business has made other artists and industry insiders speak up. At no point was Kanye allowed to object to a track being on the record if it achievedTop 100 chart success on any national trade publication at any time prior to when the Greatest Hits album was released. We took the full. "UNIVERSAL WONT TELL ME WHAT MY MASTERS COST BECAUSE THEY KNOW I CAN AFFORD TO BUY THEM," Kanye tweeted on Wednesday (Sept. 16). NO MORE. Ross Guberman [00:02:46] Its you know, its a great vehicle to take this whole plan, English idea and see if we can, you know, apply it literally seriously or both, because although you say you had an emotional breakdown, hes hardly the first part of your client to object to contract language. The language looks like something you might find, you know, 50, 100 years ago. Its all made from videos. Kanye West, also now known as Ye, has been named as a suspect in a battery report taken by the Los Angeles police department in the early hours of . Let me do a screen show real quick to show people what were talking about. Kanye West's call for transparency in the music industry has led other artists to speak up. What am I looking at here? And thats, you know, damaging conclusion from many perspectives. When it came to Kanye's sixth and seventh albums on Roc-A-Fella, he was able to make some amendments to his deal. One way to begin is by bracketing off phrases or words that you know have a substantive value. A month ago, Kanye West had an emotional breakdown on Twitter. So get rid of it. Milana Lewis, CEO of music distribution platform Stem, says record labels should start including explanatory pro-forma documents with deals, in order to promote transparency and make it easier for artists to understand what comes in their agreements. Im seeing a lot of these highlights. But first, the record labels getting their money. Pearl Jam Vinyl Records. As far as the actual deal goes, Kanyes isnt particularly bad: Music lawyerswho spoke with Rolling Stone call Wests deal standard for an artist at his level. Hit-Boy is an enormously talented songwriter whose relationship we value, a UMPG spokesperson said in a statement to Rolling Stone. So lets tear it down. We can walk you through that process and get you on the show to tear down another contract. Right. Kanye West Posts Over 100 Pages of His Record Label Contracts, Tweet by Tweet Tyler Sharp Published: September 16, 2020 David Crotty / Patrick McMullan, Getty Images Kanye West made. Youll also get webinars and daily tips on drafting and negotiating contracts, not to mention access to the worlds largest database of sample clauses and contracts. Right. on September 21, 2020. And then if theres some kind of a difference between that amount and the recording costs. call Wests deal standard for an artist at his level. GOOD Music (stylized as G.O.O.D. The lawyers in this industry who are used to the status quo are going to say its worth it, but if I make a deal with you and go to lunch and say you pay 70 [percent], I dont think youll say its fair. Mike Whelan [00:10:12] Hey, everybody, Im Mike Whelen. Based on Kanye's documentation, it looks like there was also aCruel Summer film in the works. Kanye West's history of inflammatory statements were met with consquences this week. Well see you there. So so talk to me about this profit sharing piece. For his initial contract period, Yeezy received 8percent of all singles and long-play singles,14 percent of the royalty base with respect to master recordings during initial contract period,14 percent of sales of an album in excess of 500,000 units and15 percent of sales of an album in excess of 1 million units. Wests contract could even be considered favorable among superstar contracts, with Universal heavily investing in Wests works, entertainment attorney Christiane Kinney says. Ideally, he says, artists should have legal representation working in their best interest to point out red-flag clauses: While an artist should be wary of what theyre signing rather than looking solely at the immediate paycheck, young and starry-eyed artists whove never seen so much money may not understand that yet. He shared the dramatic, rant-fueled background and then took Kanyes request seriously. The deals not bad what is that based on? Negrito asks. Somethings got a hold your drink place. . Right. Dependents. You got a bunch on the left in a very short sentence on the right. Its an interesting thing. Maybe even my own lawyer is not really looking at the language from my point of view. The sense is that someone trying to pull a fast one on me. After agreeing to the amount spent on the film, they took $1 million from Kanyes sixth album backend and then $500,000 from his seventh album's recording fund. After a slight struggle trying to share the files, Kanye boasted that him revealing his old record label contracts was going to be a literal game changer. Ye said of the images: "This is what me Kanye West deal looks like . this summer, doesnt point the finger at any one entity or group for the nature of these deals. After that point, UMG can distribute the albums on their own. Another example is General Electric. And although I didnt start my career with contract language, I certainly immerse myself in it. How can you rewrite a contract to be understandable without losing the original intent? W aiting for a Kanye West album can be an excruciating, interminable experience. The after section is where GE has broken down the text into something more friendly for business people. We didnt spend our advance on cars or jewelry, we bought a house. The split can be 80/20 in the artists favor. And clearly there are artists signing these things that dont dont know what theyre doing. We get used to these things and then sometimes, theres a wakeup call . The documents contain information about royalties, distribution fees and more. Found online, don't shoot the messenger. So, you know, my provision, these are coded blue brief catch picking up on a lot of those. This is a situation were in. That was pretty awesome. Mike Whelan [00:17:41] an interpretive sca band and Im going to have to look for the domain name. The once hesitant label has now hit the. I think this is also, frankly, probably closer to what somebody like Kanye West could demand. Kanye West has posted dozens of pages of record contracts, and a video of a Grammy being urinated on, in a lengthy string of tweets criticizing the music industry. Over the course of dozens of tweets, West. Ross Guberman [00:20:11] Yeah, I think part of that is really bracketing off, just as you are saying, words and phrases that a lawyer knows have substantive value. So theres this GE aviation series of rewritten contracts. As Kanye West escalates his battle with Universal Music Group, the Chicago rapper decided to share the entirety of his record contract on Twitter. Epic spent a fortune making that Karmin album. Everybody go get it. So if Im a lawyer and Im negotiating with another side and youre very practical about these things, like although the plain language movement is nice, in theory, youve got to negotiate with somebody else who might like that archaic language. Ross and I dig into Kanyes request for plain language drafting and whether its even realistic. The first thing that changes about Record Deals is actually lawyers. Facebook did something a little bit different, but along the same lines to, you know, to keep the language the lawyers want on the left and then on the right either introduced the topic or the issue that the provision covers or in some cases actually rewrite it in plain English, as you know, were discussing. on the Internet. So, Ross, were going to tear down the contracts that Kanye shared. West's contracts laid it all out. In in your estimation, does this thread the needle of checking the legal boxes, but also being plain enough? And then what happens is, as you can see from his other related tweets, the sense is not just, well, I dont understand the contract. Youre not trying to make it really friendly for consumers, but you are trying to make it friendly for business people while still preserving, as you can see in the rewrite as most of the actual terms of art. All contents of the lawinsider.com excluding publicly sourced documents are Copyright 2013-. Ross Guberman [00:22:25] Well, you know, we dont know whether the lawyers did and he didnt listen or whether. Were at sales@LawInsider.com. These are the documents that were talking about. The 100 Best Albums of 2022. To be a little bit difficult to argue that. Record Companies have to buy into you, not loan you. Scooter Braun Projects is a talent management company that is more than just a company. Due to a planned power outage on Friday, 1/14, between 8am-1pm PST, some services may be impacted. Until then, Ross, I appreciate you being here. Obviously, we cant share the whole thing, but well make sure that you have a link to the whole thing in the show notes over at LawInsider.com/Resources. I AM ON MY KNEES THIS MORNING," he tweeted before dropping the proof. They dont want they dont want whats on the right to somehow control. Based on the agreement,Universal Music Group gave Kanye a $3.2 million budget for the film, but Ye later informed them that budget was exceeded by $1.5 million. However, the film has not yet been released. Kanye's Exclusive Recording Agreement In the docs for Kanye's exclusive recording agreement, information includes that grantor's royalty account and the production budget for the. Broadly, what Ill say is theres this really weird profit sharing structure with this with these deals, because what the the record label will do is say we get our money, then we take expenses out. Maybe its about time I do that.. So come join us right now. Ross Guberman [00:22:31] but definitely something to that. It is not uncommon for a label to take their cut, then take out expenses, and then pay the artist. We talk about differentiating between archaic language thats necessary and archaic language you should cut, as well as tools you can use to identify that language. Ross Guberman [00:00:00] You look at these agreements, though, from Kanye, thats not just the CDC references that are archaic, the language looks like something you might find, you know, 50, 100 years ago. I have a lot of free articles and a lot of these before and after is also on Twitter. We have been engaged in an ongoing dialogue with Hit-Boy and all the concerned parties to address his concerns and will continue to do so until a reasonable solution is achieved.). Donda 2, due for release on Tuesday (February 22), is the follow-up to Ye's Grammy-nominated Donda, which achieved one of the biggest ever first weeks for an album on both Spotify and Apple Music when it was released in August last year.. 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