4 Artists Taylor Swift Could Support in Their Fight for Music Rights

Taylor Swift brought music ownership to the attention of millions of fans following her fallout with her former label. Although the pop star has chosen to stay silent on other musicians' similar struggles, here are four artists she could support to push the conversation forward.

Written by Kasey Clarke

The recent re-ignition of Taylor Swift’s feud with Kayne West and Kim Kardashian over that phone call has made Swift's prior drama — her dispute over music rights with her record label, Big Machine Records — seem like ancient history. However, Taylor’s response to the drama showed the artist’s awareness of her ability to redirect attention to more important causes. On her Instagram story, the pop star used the hype around the re-exhumed phone call to bring attention to the non-profit Feeding America and the World Health Organization’s COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund, asking fans to “swipe up to see what really matters.” While this call to action is certainly admirable, one can’t help but wonder where Swift’s passion for music rights went after her well-publicized fight with music executives Scott Borchetta and Scooter Braun ended.

In November 2019, Swift explained on social media that her old record label was blocking her from performing a medley of her biggest hits at the American Music Awards where she would be honored as Artist of the Decade. Big Machine Records is headed by music executive Scott Borchetta and manager to the likes of Ariana Grande and Justin Bieber Scooter Braun, who wield significant power in the music industry. Since they held the masters — the original recordings that are the basis for all derivative works — to her music, they could block the performance of her music, as well as its release. Because Swift was the writer of her music and its lyrics, however, she would be able to re-record them in 2020.

As expected, Swifites quickly jumped to action. Not only were Swift’s millions of fans attacking Braun and Brochetta online, many of them got crash courses in music rights, becoming Google experts in issues of authorship, ownership, copyright, and publishing. Much of the sympathy for Swift referenced the fact that she signed a record deal at only 15 years old and would not have understood the consequences of giving up control over the music she wrote. People were incredulous to how this could happen to an artist as powerful and successful as Swift. Unfortunately, it happens all the time. Operations within the music industry are usually invisible to music listeners, but still hold a lot of power over what everyone hears, and when. Many artists’ careers have been affected by signing a predatory deal when they are young, inexperienced, and unaware of what their future in the music industry could look like.

Swift isn’t the only artist caught in a legal battle with a label, but she arguably does have the biggest voice and one of the most passionate fan bases. Most artists in similar situations don’t have the ability to ruin the reputation of music industry titans overnight. But Swift’s potential to change the music industry loses its power if she only advocates for herself. Here are four musicians Taylor could turn the tide for if she wanted to speak now.

Megan thee Stallion

Megan called her relationship with record label 1501 a “greedy game” in an Instagram video explaining to fans why she could not release new music. The Houston rapper admitted that she did not understand what was in her contract when she signed as a 20-year-old fresh face in the industry. Assuming that 1501 had her best interests at heart, she was shocked that they would not agree to renegotiate her contract or allow her to release new music. Megan’s fans promptly had #FreeTheeStallion trending on Twitter in support of the artist and called on Taylor Swift to help Megan as Megan’s situation seemed to echo many of Swift’s complaints about her label.

Megan turned out not to need the help. She swiftly took action, obtaining a temporary restraining order against 1501 through a Harris County District Court on March 1, releasing her new project Suga five days later on March 6. She then moved to sue 1501 for fraud, breach of contract, and negligent misrepresentation, alleging that she was only getting 26% of recording profits despite agreeing to a 40-60 split, which is already less than a net profit deal. Although Megan has been successful in her action against her record label, a shout out from Swift would have increased the visibility of her struggle and offered a good opportunity to bring the issue back to fans’ attention. Swift even mentioned the rapper in her Woman of the Decade acceptance speech at the Billboard awards in December 2019, so many wondered why, only four months later, Swift failed to support her.

Juicy J

In late February 2020, rapper Juicy J released single “Fuk Columbia Records” including the lyrics “record labels can eat a dick” after he declared via tweet “I’m gonna leak my whole album stay tuned.” The single’s album art is a picture of Prince with “slave” written on his face, referencing Prince’s infamous nearly 20 year fight with his label Warner Bros over the ownership of his music and control of its release. The track ends with a sample of Prince’s Artist of the Decade acceptance speech at the 2000 Soul Train Awards, in which Prince warned artists, “As long as you’re signed to a contract, you’re going to take a minority share of the winnings,” and implored artists to “imagine what it would be like in our own game.” However, the song is not available online anymore as only hours after the diss track was dropped, Juicy J tweeted “Spoke to @ColumbiaRecords we all good.”

While it is unclear whether Juicy J got what he wanted from Columbia or if the label just put enough pressure on him to silence his complaints, no comment was given from Taylor Swift. Although only a small portion of this fight occured online, the use of Prince’s image and speech by Juicy J provided a good opportunity for Swift to educate her fans on the history of music labels abusing their artists. Any support from the pop star would’ve been welcomed by Juicy J who had tweeted in August that he would love to collaborate with her. Instead, Swift was entirely silent on social media after heavily promoting her music video for “The Man” only two days prior, which made many direct references to Scooter Braun who owns Swift’s masters.

Sky Ferreira

Indie pop singer Sky Ferreira immediately backed up Taylor Swift’s Instagram post about the sale of Swift’s recordings in July 2019, months before the back and forth between Swift and Big Machine Records began in November. Like Swift, Ferreira revealed that she signed contracts at 15 and is “still paying the consequences for it.” Ferreira went even further saying the entertainment industry as a whole “is full of under-qualified bullies and morons” and that “Every contract I have ever signed has always been set up to take advantage of me/my work in some way.”

Ferreira has poured much of her own money into making her records after her 2013 release of Night Time, My Time under Capitol Records. While she has been vague about her exact problems, she has often complained about “insane obstacles” her managers have put her through and her upcoming release Masochism is unclaimed by an official label. She has spoken in favor of artist freedom since she was forced to hand over her Soundcloud account information to her label in 2018 so that they could prevent her from independently releasing any music.

Although Ferreira was one of the first to voice her support, Swift, again, provided no comment.

Lil Uzi Vert

Back in the spotlight after his release of Eternal Atake on March 6, beloved rapper Lil Uzi Vert has yet to clear up lingering questions over his fight with label Generation Now. After signing to the label in 2015, Uzi has complained on and off about his deal. Rumors cropped up in 2016 that Uzi had moved to Wiz Khalifa’s Taylor Gang Entertainment, but they were quickly dismissed by Generation Now, which is owned by Atlantic Records.

Uzi is known for delaying his albums, but long, confusing roll outs are likely caused by the young artist butting heads with the owner of Generation Now, DJ Drama, who controls the release of Uzi’s music. After four projects in 2016, Uzi announced the release of “Luv is Rage 2” through Twitter in November 2016, but the mixtape would not be released until over a year later in August 2017. It was later revealed that DJ Drama, co-founder of Generation Now Don Cannon, and Atlantic Records executive Michael Kyser were withholding the project.

In January 2018, Uzi’s record label woes surfaced again as he seemed to disagree with everyone at his label but Don Cannon. Later that year Uzi announced Eternal Atake. Although he never announced a release date, it was implied the mixtape would drop before the end of the year; album art was released in July 2018 and single “New Patek” was released in September But the album never came, and Uzi eventually announced his retirement through Instagram in January 2019, explaining on Instagram Live that he had been fighting to release new music, but was continuously blocked by his label. Uzi then released the track “Free Uzi” in March 2019, although it took another full year until Uzi was actually free to release his music.

With one of the longest and most well-documented record label fights of the 2010s, Lil Uzi Vert is another artist with a young, vocal fanbase who has supported him through his tumultuous releases. Taylor Swift could engage this audience if she chose to lead the conversation surrounding music rights and record label abuses, but she remains focused on her own projects.

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It is dangerous and unfair to assume that all prominent public figures must be educated about every social issue. But, it is not unfair to expect a celebrity to use their platform to improve upon the things they take up as personal causes, especially when it affects their own industry.

Swift made a spectacle of shedding her old “good girl” identity with the release of Reputation to become a more mature and outspoken artist, and a seemingly new interest in public activism came with it. However, her specific brand of activism falls short for many observers who feel that her outspokenness is self-serving. Swift only urged fans to vote for Democratic candidates in Tennessee’s 2018 midterm elections after she was called out for staying non-partisan in the 2016 presidential election, and so-called gay anthem “You Need to Calm Down” was accused of performative allyship after so many years of Swift’s silence on LGBTQ issues. So it seems similarly self-serving that Swift would only call out issues in the music industry when she becomes a victim of them herself. With over 15 years in the music business, she has surely witnessed this type of unfairness before, and with similar feuds unfolding since last November, one would expect Swift to at least boost the visibility of these antagonized artists since music rights issues are supposed to be so near and dear to her heart.

To be clear, Swift is certainly generous and does a lot to support her hometown of Nashville, Tennessee. She also has helped other artists through her earlier efforts to fight licensing issues in the industry; withholding her music from Spotify to take a stance on streaming royalty and artist pay issues resulted in many of Universal Music Group’s artists getting ways to protect their profits from streaming platforms. Swift covered some of Kesha’s legal bills from her fight to get music ownership rights back from her abuser Dr. Luke. And plenty of other artists, like Frank Ocean and JoJo, have quietly fought their record labels for the freedom to own and release their music on their terms, without making it a public issue.

Still, this fight cannot be won alone. Artists have been given unfair pay, unfair contracts, little power, and no ownership over their own creative work since the inception of the music industry. For things to change, it is going to take every artist, especially the biggest ones with the biggest following, to push for change even after their own issues get resolved.

Afterglow ATXApril 16, 2020kasey clarke