Music distributor FUGA said on Thursday that the company declined to work with West last year, but that a “long-standing” client of the service uploaded the album
The distributor for Kanye West and Ty Dolla $ign’s album Vultures 1 is in the process of removing the album from streaming services, the company confirms to Rolling Stone, stating that the album had been uploaded despite the distributor previously declining to work with West on the rollout.
FUGA, a music distributor owned by the Downtown Music Holdings, said on Thursday that while the company had declined an offer to work with West last year, another FUGA user apparently working with West had uploaded the album anyways.
“Late last year, FUGA was presented with the opportunity to release Vultures 1. Exercising our judgment in the ordinary course of business, we declined to do so,” a spokesperson for Downtown Music, FUGA’s parent company, said in a statement. “On Friday, February 9, 2024, a long-standing FUGA client delivered the album Vultures 1 through the platform’s automated processes, violating our service agreement. Therefore, FUGA is actively working with its DSP partners and the client to remove Vultures 1 from our systems.” (A rep for West didn’t immediately respond to request for comment.)
Music distributors work on behalf of recording artists to upload music onto streaming services like Spotify and Apple Music. Distributors often have the discretion to remove music. Presumably West would need a new distributor to re-release the album assuming he can’t come to an agreement with FUGA.
FUGA’s decision is the crescendo of what’s already been a messy rollout, even by Kanye West standards. The album suffered multiple delays before finally getting released last week. Since the release, Ozzy Osbourne blasted West last week for using an unauthorized Black Sabbath sample, calling West an antisemite. The estate for Donna Summers also said that West used the singer’s “I Feel Love” despite not getting a clearance for the track.
