Most of De La Soul‘s albums have never been available on streaming platforms, or for digital purchase, due to complications with samples. Now, the group have revealed that all the music will be available soon, but they’ll only get a tiny amount of profit from it. “We are not happy about releasing our catalog under such unbalanced, unfair terms,” De La wrote on Instagram.
“The music will be released digitally,” the continued. “After 30 long years of good music and paying their debt to hip-hop, De La Soul unfortunately, will not taste the fruit of their labor. Your purchase will roughly go 90% Tommy Boy, 10% De La.”
However, all samples aren’t actually being cleared beforehand. “When confronted and questioned whether or not all samples had been cleared for our catalog’s streaming release, Tommy Boy felt that it would be better to move forward with the release and deal with all claims/lawsuits later on… really????” De La added. “That’s just not smart business. We don’t want to be sued.”
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