World News – GB – Taylor Swift says Scooter Braun has sold the rights to her album for the second time

The two have been competing for the rights to the album since 2019, when they bought their old record company

Taylor Swift said that for the second time in two years, influential music director Scooter Braun was involved in acquiring major rights to her first six albums without her knowledge or consent, this time selling them to a private equity firm for hundreds of millions of dollars..

It has been trying to buy the rights for itself since 2019, after Brown Holdings bought its former home record company.

Swift said in a statement on Twitter that Brown, who also runs businesses like Justin Bieber and Ariana Grande, asked her to sign a « strict » non-disclosure agreement (NDA) that obligates her not to publicly underestimate him before they enter negotiations, and that he will not quote her a price for rights..

« So, I must sign a document that will silence me forever before I have the opportunity to bid on my business, » she wrote. “My legal team said that this is not normal at all, and they have never seen such a non-disclosure agreement offered unless it was intended to silence an assault suspect by paying their money..

Representatives of the Big Machine Label Group (BMLG), the Nashville-based independent brand that sold the rights, and Shamrock Holdings, which was reported to have purchased it, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Brown’s media holding company, BMLG, where the pop star recorded her first six albums, bought in 2019 for more than $ 300 million, securing key rights to Swift’s early work with her.. In 2018, she signed a contract for new recordings with Universal Music Group.

According to Swift, Brown then sold the rights, along with « 100% of my music, videos, and album art » to Shamrock in recent weeks, at a price in excess of US $ 300 million, and required the investment group not to notify the singer Sell ​​only after its completion.

As part of the statement, Swift also included a letter she sent to Shamrock, saying that she did not want to partner with them for anything in the future because it meant enriching Brown, who allegedly would continue to make profits from the catalog for « many years » under the terms of the deal.

« I simply cannot, in good conscience, force myself to participate in directly or indirectly benefiting from Scooter Braun’s interests, » she wrote. “It is a shame to know that I will now not be able to help grow the future of these past works and it hurts deeply to remain detached from the music I have spent more than a decade creating, but this is a sacrifice I must make to keep Scooter Braun out of my life..

Brown hasn’t said much about the controversy publicly, but he told Variety in 2019 that he believes social media is not the place to expose controversies like this..

“I think we live in a time of toxic division, and people are thinking that social media is the right place to express each other and not have conversations,” he said.. “And I don’t like politicians doing that. I don’t like anyone doing that, and if that means I have to be the bad guy for longer, I’ll be the bad guy for longer, but I won’t.

He also said in an open letter to Instagram that the row between the two caused him and his family to face death threats, and that he had tried to work with Swift on a suitable deal.. .

Last year, Swift said it would start re-registering its old materials as a way to reclaim ownership, and in the statement it said the work is continuing..

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Taylor Swift, Scooter Braun, Big Machine Records, Re-Record