Kanye West Responds to Claim That Jay Z Sold His Masters

Jay Z Reportedly Sold Kanye West’s Masters To Buy Back His Own – Ye Responds

This week has been a dramatic one for Kanye West, who’s been fighting hard to free artists from slave contracts. Ye went as far as sharing screenshots of all of his record label contracts and a video of him peeing on Grammy Award.

Earlier today, there were reports that Kanye already owns some of his masters but, apparently, the rights to his first six albums were sold by Jay-Z, the artist’s “big brother”, who sold them to buy back his own.

According to a dissection of his contracts, Ye’s first six albums were under the Roc-A-Fella imprint, which Jay-Z owns. His contract states that he signed for an advance on his six albums, which include College Dropout, Late Registration, Graduation, and more, but that the masters belonged to Roc.

When Def Jam purchased Roc-A-Fella in 2004, Def Jam then became the owner of some of Kanye’s most prized works. HOV’s deal with Def Jam was made to secure his own master recordings, which means that, in effect, he sold the majority of Kanye’s solo discography just for his own profit.

Jay reportedly did so with the understanding that, in the future, Def Jam likely would not make a deal with Kanye to sell them back. But Kanye has now taken to Twitter to debunk the rumors, saying that Jay Z was just another victim of the system.

“Don’t let the system pit us against each other. JAY IS MY BROTHER … I have eternal love for all artist that have been through and are still trapped this crooked system,” Kanye commented on the initial report from DJ Akademiks.

“Jay still doesn’t get his own masters back for ten years. I will see to it that we all get our masters,” he added.

Don’t let the system pit us against each other … JAY IS MY BROTHER … I have eternal love for all artist that have been through and are still trapped this crooked system. Jay still doesn’t get his own masters back for ten years. I will see to it that we all get our masters pic.twitter.com/LshyaIVO1Y

— ye (@kanyewest) September 18, 2020