Big Machine Records has denied Taylor Swift‘s claims that the label’s owners, Scooter Braun and Scott Borchetta, have banned her from performing her old hits at the upcoming American Music Awards.
In a statement released to Page Six, Big Machine Label Group — which holds the rights to many of Swift’s classic tunes — called the singer’s claims “false information” and rejected her statement that the group has control over her performances.
“As Taylor Swift’s partner for over a decade, we were shocked to see her tumblr statements yesterday based on false information. At no point did we say Taylor could not perform on the AMAs or block her Netflix special. In fact, we do not have the right to keep her from performing live anywhere,” the music company wrote in its statement.
“Since Taylor’s decision to leave Big Machine last fall, we have continued to honor all of her requests to license her catalog to third parties as she promotes her current record in which we do not financially participate.”
Swift departed her original record label and signed a new deal with Universal Music Group in November 2018 that allowed her to own her master recordings going forward. Braun and Borchetta own her catalog from her 2006 self-titled debut album through 2017’s “Reputation,” which she described as a “worst case scenario” in a scathing note about Braun’s acquisition.
Big Machine Label Group’s statement also echoed Page Six’s exclusive reporting that Swift owes Braun and Borchetta $7 million, according to our sources.
“We have worked diligently to have a conversation about these matters with Taylor and her team to productively move forward. We started to see progress over the past two weeks and were optimistic as recently as yesterday that this may get resolved,” the statement continued.
Although the company felt they were seeing “progress” in its negotiations with Swift and her team, Big Machine claims that “despite our persistent efforts to find a private and mutually satisfactory solution, Taylor made a unilateral decision last night to enlist her fanbase in a calculated manner that greatly affects the safety of our employees and their families.”
Shortly after Braun and Borchetta issued their responses, Swift’s rep Tree Paine fired back in a statement on Twitter.
The statement read: “The truth is, on October 28, 2019 at 5:17 p.m., the Vice President, Rights Management and Business Affairs from Big Machine Label Group sent Taylor Swift’s team the following: ‘Please be advised that BMLG will not agree to issue licences for existing recordings or waivers of its re-recording restrictions in connection with these two projects: The Netflix documentary and The Ablibaba “Double Eleven” event.'”
The rep continued: “To avoid an argument over rights, Taylor performed three songs off her new album Lover at the Double Eleven event as it was clear that Big Machine Label Group felt any televised performance of catalog songs violated her agreement. In addition, yesterday Scott Borchetta, CEO and founder of Big Machine Label Group, flatly denied the request for both American Music Awards and Netflix. Please notice in Big Machine’s statement, they never actually deny either claim Taylor said last night in her post.
“Lastly, Big Machine is trying to deflect and make this about money by saying she owes them but, an independent professional auditor has determined that Big Machine owes Taylor $7.9 million dollars of unpaid royalties over several years.”