Did Prince intend to have his music streamed exclusively on Tidal forever, or just
a short period of time? And did Tidal pay a $750,000 advance that the Prince Estate claims was due? These questions and more will now be answered in court.
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The battle between Jay Z’s Tidal and the Estate of Prince over his streaming music rights is headed to court.
Late last week, Jay Z’s Roc Nation filed a petition asking the court to enforce what they say is an agreement making Tidal his exclusive streamer. The Prince Estate in turn filed a motion accusing Roc Nation and Tidal of continuing to stream 15 Prince albums without authorization after an initial agreement ran out.
On June 7th, to celebrate what would have been Prince’s 58th birthday, Tidal added 15 albums from Prince’s catalog including his “Black Album”, “Crystal Ball” and records from his ‘Artist Formerly Known As’ period, the “Girl 6” soundtrack, live albums and two from New Power Generation.
The Estate also claims that they found no proof that Tidal paid a promised $750,000 advance for a Tidal exclusive latest album “Hit N Run: Phase One”, and a source connected to the estate tells Rolling Stone they have not found any paperwork proving that Prince even had a contract with Tidal.
Here is the full court filing from Roc Nation/Tidal:
Prince Tidal by mendle44 on Scribd