Kanye West Wants To Help Taylor Swift Get Her Masters Back

West tweeted he will “personally see to it that Taylor Swift gets her masters back,” noting that Scooter Braun is a “close family friend.”

Braun’s Ithaca Holdings reportedly paid $300 million last year to buy Big Machine Records, which owned the rights to the master recordings of Swift’s first six albums.

Swift wrote in a Tumblr post at the time that she had no advance warning about the label’s sale and that she had “pleaded” for a chance to own her work for years, but, “Instead I was given an opportunity to sign back up to Big Machine Records and ‘earn’ one album back at a time, one for every new one I turned in.” 

Swift signed a contract with Universal Music Publishing Group and its label Republic Records in 2018 which she said gave her ownership of the masters for her work with them, and she has said as part of the deal she asked Universal Music Publishing Group to ensure any sale of its Spotify shares result in equity for the label’s artists. 

Swift has campaigned for artists rights previously, including engaging in public wars with Apple Music and Spotify over artist payouts.

West and Swift, who have had years-long tension, have both advocated for artists to own their music.