Kanye West’s video came after a series of tweets that criticized Universal Records and Sony and compared the music industry to a slave ship.
Rapper and music producer Kanye West shared a video Wednesday of him urinating on a Grammy Award following a series of tweets that criticized music labels over their ownership of rights to artists’ music.
“Trust me… I WON’T STOP,” the 43-year-old captioned the video.“
0090% of the record contracts on the planet are still on a royalty A standard record deal is a trap to NEVER have you recoup, and there’s all these hidden costs like the “distribution fees” many labels put in their contracts to make even more money off our work without even trying,” he wrote in one tweet.
The video, which has been viewed over 26 million times, showed one of his Grammy’s placed inside a toilet while West urinates on it.
West is the latest among prominent artists to demand that he be allowed own the rights to his original records or ‘masters’.
Most artists sign away their rights to an original record to a record label either for a set period of time or the length of copyright. Record companies can then license the use of the music on streaming services, in films, ads or other products.
Singer Taylor Swift was involved in a similar feud over her masters recently and accused a record label of not allowing her to sing her old songs at an event since they owned the rights to the masters.
In a series of tweets, West criticized Universal Records and Sony and compared the music industry to a slave ship. West also promised to not make new music under his current contract until he owns his masters.
He also shared several pictures of his alleged contact with Universal Records saying, “all the musician will be free”.
West called for support from Swift (with whom he’s had a long-running feud), U2 lead singer Bono, rappers Drake, and Kendrick Lamar.
Some like songwriter Diane Warren, responded to West’s video and condemned the act, calling it “vile and disrespectful”.
West’s battle against the record labels comes after a highly-publicised but failed bid to contest this year’s presidential elections. Though he made the ballot in 12 states, West’s campaign was majorly hampered by a series of failure to meet deadlines in key states.
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