Hello fellow fandomites,
Where do we start… I guess we’ll have to deal with the ugly item of the week. Scott Borchetta has sold Big Machine Records to Scooter Braun, and that includes the masters of all of Taylor Swift’s back catalog (Taylor Swift, Fearless, Speak Now, Red, 1989 & Reputation). Taylor is not happy that Scooter Braun now owns her past music. Her reasons, as it turns out, is that Braun has been an active participant in bullying her more than once.
You can read Taylor Swift’s Tumblr post on the subject here.
Now, the part that is being disputed are Taylor Swift’s masters. I’m 100% sure she still receives royalties if Big Machine decides to release a big hits or compilation album, as well as if anybody wants to use her old music for any project. The part that I’m not aware is if her permission will be required. The masters are the original version of the song. Taylor does not lose her rights as a songwriter.
I know that in a case of history being revisited, we’re going to go back and forth on whether Taylor knew or not. There’s already a rebuttal concerning Scott Swift who is shareholder, not a member of the board of Big Machine. There was a meeting but he didn’t attend due to a NDA (non-disclosure agreement) that would have forbidden him to discuss it with her daughter.
Scott Borchetta has replied by disclosing the BMLG response to a proposal made on August 15, 2018 from Taylor Swift.
There’s more, but… Here’s the problem. This is, arguably, part of the dark side of the music business. More than that, our participation as a fandom is limited to social media commentary. Yes, #WeStandWithTaylor. Feel free to support her. But don’t do that by harassing other people, as much as you feel you must. I know it sounds naive to ask people to keep it civil. I’m still going to ask.
As for the deal, who knows what comes next. Dirt is flying back and forth and I don’t want to cover that. If there are any actual developments to the story, I will follow up.
On happier news, the Sparkly Dressed performs on Amazon’s Prime Day Concert on July 10 at 9pm ET. You can watch it if you have Prime Video. There’s always a catch, eh?
Stay cool, people.
Coming up in the Calendar!
- July 10: Taylor Swift performs on Amazon’s Prime Day Concert live on Prime Video at 9pm ET.
- August 23: Taylor Swift releases her seventh studio album, Lover.
(Sources: Taylor Swift via Tumblr. Scott Borchetta via BigMachineLabelGroup.com)
The Swift Agency 
I don’t like how she describes herself as a 15 year old victim. Where were her parents back then? Didn’t she hire a lawyer? What did she think would happen? Scott borchetta giving her the masters as a present? It’s business and she takes part in it. Kinda hypocritical to criticise it the second you don’t earn millions out of it…
I like your post. Well said.