Scooter Braun is hoping to set the record straight with regard to his “very unfortunate” professional rift with Taylor Swift.
The music mogul acquired Swift’s master recordings from her first six albums in 2019 as part of a controversial $300 million deal with her former record label, Big Machine. After news of the sale broke, Swift published a lengthy Tumblr blog post accusing Braun of “manipulative bullying” and orchestrating conflicts she’s had with Justin Bieber, Kim Kardashian and Kanye West.
In an interview with Variety published Wednesday, Braun expressed regret over how the deal was publicly handled.
“All of what happened has been very confusing and not based on anything factual,” said the executive, who counts Ariana Grande and Demi Lovato among his clients. “I don’t know what story she was told. I asked for her to sit down with me several times, but she refused. I offered to sell her the catalog back and went under NDA, but her team refused. It all seems very unfortunate.”
“Open communication is important and can lead to understanding,” he continued. “She and I only met briefly three or four times in the past, and all our interactions were really friendly and kind.”
A year after the acquisition, Braun sold the rights to the Swift recordings to a private equity company called Shamrock Holding, netting a reported $160 million profit.
As for Swift herself, she’s begun re-recording her albums from the Big Machine era, which span from 2006’s “Taylor Swift” to 2017’s “Reputation,” in an effort to regain artistic and financial control over that material. The second of those albums, “Red (Taylor’s Version),” is due to be released in November.
She also described a much different scenario last fall, stressing that Braun’s had insisted she sign an “ironclad NDA” before agreeing to proceed with the sale.
“So I would have to sign a document that would silence me forever before I could even have a chance to bid on my own work,” she wrote in a statement at the time. “My legal team said that this is absolutely NOT normal, and they’ve never seen an NDA like this presented unless it was to silence an accuser by paying them off. He would never even quote my team a price. These master recordings were not for sale to me.”
Elsewhere in his Variety interview, Braun said he felt personally hurt at having been labeled a “bully.”
“I’m firmly against anyone ever being bullied,” he explained. “I always try to lead with appreciation and understanding. The one thing I’m proudest of in that moment was that my artists and team stood by me. They know my character and my truth. That meant a lot to me.”
“In the long run, I’m happy for my life’s work to be the legacy I leave behind,” he noted.