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Artistes and their managers or producers have always found themselves at crossroads, with signed contracts at the centre of the storm. And as Jackson Onyango writes, some of these conflicts have even become fierce legal battles.

Showbiz executes some of the best of publicity stunts, while behind the curtains, shady deals run the show.

In the recent times, the legal conflict pitting radio presenter and talent manager Mwalimu Rachel and popular gengetone group Sailors has opened a can of worms in regards to the value of artiste’s catalogue.

The feud has been an eye-opener for many players in the industry, after Rachel demanded the music group must part with Sh1.5 million to get the login details to their YouTube channel, after they allegedly signed a new contract with another entity.

In late October last year, Rachel was reported to have cut ties with the Wainame hitmakers.

She was accused by concerned parties of taking advantage of the young lads’ success.

But according to her, the reason for the two parties to part ways was because the group had signed a deal with Black Market Africa (BMA) without her knowledge.

“In October 2019, a certain record label approached my team (MRX Media) about signing Sailors.

After much deliberation and consultation, we thought it would be a good idea to involve this label in distribution of their music.

We alerted Sailors. We were now as Sailors managers having talks and looking at the contracts given to us by this record company,” says Rachel, going on to state that in the midst of all the proceedings, one of the Sailor’s members, Miracle Baby went ahead and signed the contract with BMA behind her back.

The group then shot a music video with their new label and Rachel, as usual, uploaded it to the group’s YouTube channel, and later on tried to find grounds to work with BMA.

Issues got to a boiling point when BMA asked for the login passwords, and that’s when all hell broke lose.

“As a business, that has no binding contract or agreement with a third party, would it make sense to just hand over the logins?

The simple answer is no. The record label saw it fit to ask me to sell them the YouTube channel for Sh100,000,” says Rachel, adding that after consultations with her company MRX Media Ltd, the channel was found to be worth Sh1.5 million, and this is to any interested buyer.

Investment returns

She also says she feels she has “underquoted” the figure considering the investment put into the group’s development.

The bidding war and drama continues to drag on, with businessmen and artiste Karuga Kimani aka KRG The Don Lobos offering to purchase the Sailor’s performing rights for Sh3 million.

“Let’s be clear on this part. I am very ready to cut cords with Sailors, after all it’s just business, nothing personal, but I know there’s a proper way to do it.

I’m not trying to “hold on” as many would argue. I am simply doing what’s best for my company and the investment we put into them.

You don’t simply hand over logins and other sensitive material simply because your artiset has “moved on”.

Equity, ownership and return on investment. Read up on that,” says Rachel.

According to lawyer Jeffrey Tanyasis, the copyrights and legal binding of an artiste’s performance rights and content are pertinent issues to contend with.

“The following issues arise: What does the contract between MRX Media Ltd and Sailors provide on ownership of the content in the YouTube account?

Who owns it, Sailors or Mwalimu Rachel? What does the contract provide on the event of termination?

Who retains the content? Did the contract provide for entering into other agreements? Were the musical works copyrighted?” 

Tanyasis gives Rachel the benefit of doubt that in the case Sailors entered another agreement without her knowledge it could be breach of their existing contract with her.

Even so, if Sailors copyrighted the work, then Rachel would be infringing their rights by retaining their work on the channel.

The contract signed should be clear on who had control over the content in the YouTube channel.

In January this year, singer Bahati-owned Eastlands Most Beloved Records (EMB) was involved in a scandal where young artiste Peter Blessings was accused of robbing Bahati Sh2 million.

Bahati then had him and producer Paulo’s arrested. They spent a weekend behind bars only to be freed on a Sh200,000 cash bail. 

The case turned into a sour legal battle between the two, with Peter claiming he was baited to sign a contract, and had never received any of his royalties from songs distributed by EMB on commercial digital platform Skiza Tunes, while Bahati maintained that the artiste had breached the contract. 

Clout chasing 

Lota Wood, the CEO of Teknologos Irakoze aka iLogos, who is also KRG The Don manager, states that in Kenya, word of mouth is valued more than the actual signing of contracts.

“With my experience having done music business in different countries, the Kenyan music industry is unique in its approach.

Work gets done, but it’s hard to take artistes seriously. They are fearful of lawyers because that will cost them money to draft legal documents that protect their rights.

Personally, my work is copyrighted in a strong judicial system, the San Francisco law,” he tells Spice. 

More on fraudulent contractual situations that had a twist of clout-chasing entangled on them was the ‘king of drama’ producer Magix Enga, and his “signed” artiste Rudra Kartel.

When dancehall act Rudra signed to Magix Empire Studios as a recording artiste in February 2020, he never knew the rollercoaster ride he had just signed for.

Although the contract has been kept confidential, the two orchestrated one of the most iconic promotional acts of Rudra’s song Showbiz.

Apparently, Rudra went on a believable online rant that he had been “conned out of his contract” by Magix Empire, before announcing his true intention by releasing a song days later.

If someone was seeing that clip for the first time, they would almost certainly be sold to Rudra’s pain, or better yet his acting flair. 

With blogs and some mainstream media outlets falling for the antics after picking up the story and running with it. Days later, the song was released via YouTube.

“Don’t believe everything you see on social media. Now you know inaitwa showbiz.

My coming soon EP produced by Magix Enga,” Rudra wrote on his Instagram page.

There has been reports that Magix and producer Motif Di Don have been wrangling over publishing rights for Rudra’s music, a claim Motif vehemently denies.

“I am not in the business of signing artistes at all. I deal with signed artistes such as Ethic, and work with legal teams, but that is not my forte.

For Rudra, somebody told me he was in the ghetto, idle and wasting away. That I should reach out to him and record, which happened,” says Motif.

Magix admits to have staged the signed contract with Rudra and used Diamond Platnumz’ name to promote Showbiz.

“I had to do this for my artiste Rudra Kartel to understand the meaning of showbiz.

He has been working on his new EP (mini-album) #RudraKartelShowbiz, so I had to plan the whole thing. Quarantine is just a vibe,” he said.

Talented singer Steph Kapela walked out of a promising deal with producer Atwal’s record label right after a great start that produced Kapela’s staple song Got The Sauce.

Most recently, rap duo TNT dumped their maiden music recording and publishing label Vice Life Entertainment (VLE) to pursue their own independent label Quarry Boys Entertainment (QBE).

They teamed up with music executive Arthur Oloo Jinx and Shirwa aka Big Gucc, who are said will manage and patronise TNT. “VLE could not match our ambition,” said TNT member TwennyEights.

Business opportunists capitalise off artistes’ financial desperation and leverage off on their ignorance, jeopardising careers that are barely off the ground.

Young artistes can at least pick up these valuable lessons earlier in their journeys before getting intertwined in such stressful situations later in their careers.