Kanye West and Ty Dolla $ign's collab album Vultures did not come out in collaboration with a record label, and that means the artists earned a whole lot more cash than usual. Moreover, Billboard recently released a report on their estimated earnings from this release method, only partnering with distributor Label Engine to put the record out commercially. After its No. 1 debut on the Billlboard 200 chart, we can assume that they netted a lot of money from not having to split this with a label. As such, the outlet believes that they took home about $986,000 from this supposed series' first installment.
Furthermore, this made them look back at Ye's previous 2020 comments on label contracts. He advocated for artists to earn at least 80% of their music's profits and full ownership of their copyright that they can lease out to labels and publishers for a limited time. Label Engine, Vultures' distributor, indicates that clients get 82.5% of revenue, something that Kanye West and Ty Dolla Sign have plenty of leverage to raise in their favor. But the outlet thinks that this number (under the assumption that 5% of earnings went to the distributor) goes up when considering global streams and publishing.
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Of course, these numbers hinge on streaming success and some additional sales for a slight boost. This situation is a big change from Kanye West's old contracts, such as his 14% royalty rate for The College Dropout. In earlier contracts, he would've had to reach this commercial success seven times over to reach the same amount of profits Vultures netted. Sure, this is also only possible for someone of the Chicago rapper's magnitude, plus Ty Dolla's own success and that of their featured guests. As such, this is independent in the technical sense of the term; Ye is no indie darling on the industry hustle.
Also, we must consider all the money behind promotional, budgetary, and marketing benefits that partnering with labels provided in the past. Given the Yeezy creative's antisemitic behavior, this extra push that his albums had to become mainstream cultural benchmarks isn't there anymore. But add onto this clothing sales, and there's been a lot of revenue to collect around Vultures, for better or worse. For more news and the latest updates on Kanye West, Ty Dolla Sign, and Vultures, come back to HNHH.
