Now there are two sides to every story. Artists want to express themselves and labels want to make money. And if you think labels are in it for anything but the money, you’re wrong, certainly not the major labels. Make it a labor of love and let’s see how many employees are left…zilch.

But this doesn’t count against my commitment story is popping up ever more frequently. I can see both sides in theory, sometimes the act just wants off the label or a higher royalty that’s in the contract for further LPs, and other times the label just wants to keep the act as long as it can for as cheap as it can.

But what’s definitely clear is there’s an adversary relationship. And this adversary relationship is killing the major labels.

It’s very simple. I give you the money, I tell you what to do. What artist wants to be told what to do? And if you don’t want to be told what to do, don’t take the money.

And that’s the paradigm that’s growing today. Artists are doing it for themselves. You can sell and get paid via Tunecore. And is radio gonna play your music anyway? That’s where the major label relationship is, radio and possibly TV, but how many acts are deserving of major TV exposure today? And that’s more a reflection of vapid TV outlets than the acts.

Terry McBride had it right. He was just too early. You want to unify the copyrights. So you’re in control. So you can say yes or no.

A little birdie sent me the below e-mail with this note attached:

"In a nut shell he has an album titled ‘Lost Tapes 2’ that his fans have been dying to have since his first one came out in 2005. They seem to not understand the cultural impact the first one had. The album is done and now they are saying he can put it out but it won’t count on his deal and they won’t pay for it but still want all the benefits of a new nas album."

And here it is: