“Delusional”: Megan Thee Stallion’s Label Hits Back On Claims They Won’t Let Her Release Music
Earlier this week, a court granted the rapper a restraining order against the label, allowing her to drop a new track.
After rapper Megan Thee Stallion took her grievances with her label public on Monday, the #FreeTheeStallion movement took off to get her out of her contract. Now, label head Carl Crawford has called Megan’s accusations a “whole lie”, alleging that she is using her social media following to essentially ditch him for Jay-Z’s label.
On March 1, Megan took to Instagram to allege that her label, 1501 Certified Entertainment, had frozen her ability to release new music, despite her debut album Suga being recorded and ready to go.
After a massive 2019 off the back of #HotGirlSummer taking off and her mixtape Fever, Megan released Suga‘s lead single ‘B.I.T.C.H.’ this January, but nothing since. The Houston rapper alleged that things went sour with 1501 after she signed with Roc Nation, Jay-Z’s management company, in September, and was advised to renegotiate her label contract after her new managers found it severely lacking.
According to Megan, her music was being held hostage in hopes she’d drop her renegotiation. She’s since filed a lawsuit against 1501, and been granted a temporary restraining order against her own label — meaning new music is coming this Friday.
The lawsuit claims that Megan receives just 40 percent of her recordings’ profits, and has to pay the likes of producers, mixers and studios out of that: on top of that, the label allegedly keeps 30 percent of touring and merch revenue. All-together, she alleges she’s been paid US $15,000 by them since 2018 out of the US $7 million she’s generated, and her naivety in the music industry was taken advantage of to leave her with an unfair contract.
Now, 1501’s head Carl Crawford has come out calling all of Megan’s claims a “whole lie”. In an interview with Billboard, Crawford alleges Megan actually owes 1501 money after going quiet on them after signing with Roc Nation, in an attempt to “strong-arm” a contract negotiation and get out of a 4-record deal.
“It’s almost on some delusional type stuff,” he said. “The bubble of Hollywood and her eight million followers has really clouded her head, because the stuff that she’s saying is not true.”
He also says Megan has gotten much more than US $15000 from 1501, and that he has “the receipts”.
“They’re using [social media] as a strong-arm tactic so that I can renegotiate the contract. They’re holding the money, and they haven’t paid me since August. She done over 15 shows. Y’all do the math. She gets $100,000 a show.”
Crawford paints the dispute differently, framing himself as the small player being manoeuvred against by Roc Nation, who want Megan for themselves. The situation is reminiscent, in some ways, to Taylor Swift’s issues with former label head Scott Borchetta and ex-manager Scooter Braun over the ownership of her masters — a situation of back-and-forth public statements with little legal end in sight.
As of writing, Megan Thee Stallion hasn’t responded to Crawford’s interview. Her new song is out Friday 6 March: in the meantime, listen to ‘B.I.T.C.H.’ below.