Taylor Swift's attorney has fired back at claims suggesting her former record label boss gave her the chance to buy back all her master recordings, insisting that deal was never on the table.
Swift attacked Big Machine Label Group's founder Scott Borchetta over the weekend after he sold his company, including her "legacy", to Justin Bieber's manager Scooter Braun without giving her the chance to snap the recordings up.
Borchetta responded by insisting Taylor was mistaken and he had given her every opportunity to buy the masters before she left the label, but her attorney, Don Passman, insists that's not the case.
In a statement released to the media on Tuesday (02Jul19), Passman wrote: "Scott Borchetta never gave Taylor Swift an opportunity to purchase her masters, or the label, outright with a check in the way he is now apparently doing for others."
Swift is unhappy with Braun's takeover and she took to Tumblr over the weekend to call his purchase of her masters her "worst case scenario", adding she has suffered "incessant, manipulative bullying" at his hands.
Taylor also explained: "For years I asked, pleaded for a chance to own my work. Instead I was given an opportunity to sign back up to Big Machine Records and 'earn' one album back at a time, one for every new one I turned in."
Borchetta dismissed Swift's assertion, stating: "100% of all Taylor Swift assets were to be transferred to her immediately upon signing the new agreement. We were working together on a new type of deal for our new streaming world that was not necessarily tied to 'albums' but more of a length of time... Taylor had every chance in the world to own not just her master recordings, but every video, photograph, everything associated to her career. She chose to leave."
Swift left BMLG, her label home for well over a decade, for a global deal with Universal Music Group in November (18). The masters for her first six albums are now owned by Braun's Ithaca Holdings.
