Ashanti is following in the footsteps of Taylor Swift and is re-recording her previous albums. The “Foolish” singer sat down with Angie Martinez and explained that since she doesn’t own her masters, she’s re-recording her projects so she can recoup the financial benefits of her hard work.
“The thinking behind that is showing the business side of ownership and how important it is to own. And then once I rerecord the first album, I own it. So everything purchased from that moment I own,” explained Ashanti.
Irv Gotti, Ashanti’s former label head at Murder Inc. Records, got wind of the interview and wasn’t too pleased about the singer’s plans. Apparently the two haven’t’ seen eye-to-eye for a minute and he hit up Martinez on Instagram to shed more light on Ashanti’s decision.
“@angiemartinez just for super clarity, I own all those great Ashanti Albums Angie. I own the masters and I produced all those great Ashanti Albums. So I also own a good portion of the Publishing. What she is trying to do is re record all those great records and put them out on her label. She can do this under the COVER laws. But she is basically trying to f–k me out of my Masters. And make people decide which album to listen too or stream. Hoping her loyal fans will choose her version. But hey, I stand on the magic that was created. And I wanna see her duplicate that magic. It’s f—–d up really. But such is life,” Irv Gotti posted.
The record executive has a right to be concerned, however, as iHeartRadio announced this week that they would only be playing the re-recorded Taylor Swift songs throughout their 850 stations. Swift released Taylor’s Version of her hit album Red after previously revealing she would re-record her old albums because she didn’t own the masters. According to Billboard, Red (Taylor’s Version) pulled in more than 90.8 million global streams on the day of its release. She re-recorded and re-released her fist album Fearless as well in March.
Check out Ashanti’s interview with Angie Martinez below as she discusses her album re-working plans around the 9-min mark.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqzLtxMxv6w[/embedyt]
