André 3000 reveals his Grammy-nominated flute album didn’t count towards record contract
André 3000 released his long-awaited solo album in late 2023, but surprisingly, the project will not affect his record contract.
New Blue Sun saw the Outkast musician diving into jazz territory by playing the flute; according to the terms of his deal, the Grammy-nominated release isn’t enough to count as an album.
During a new interview with Touré, Three Stacks explained how his contract with Epic Records works and admitted his initial confusion about the whole thing. The reason traces back to the state of the music industry half a century ago.
“Contractually, it’s very interesting. My label will not count this album against my contract — this is as a solo artist,” he said. “I didn’t understand it at first and we tried to find ways around it, but I understand it in a way, too. My attorney explained it in this way: it was invented in the ’70s maybe, when artists were trying to get out of their deals so they were just pretty much turning in anything.”
André 3000 stated that the process stops artists from releasing albums of, say, handclaps to get out of their deals. Despite the label knowing he wouldn’t do that, it’s just their standard stance.
“You have to have some type of legal stipulation that stops you from doing that,” he said. “It’s something where it says, ‘The next recording has to be 90 percent like the recording before it.’ You see what I’m saying?! It’s in everybody’s deal, they don’t know it ’cause most people are not doing this kind of thing.”
Still, he explained that New Blue Sun not counting towards his contract isn’t rushing him into dropping a hip-hop album, reiterating that a project of him rapping doesn’t exist.
“I’m not like, ‘Let’s hurry up and get out of this deal. I want to put out this rap album.’ No, I don’t have a rap album, none of that kinda shit, so I’m not stressed about it,” he said. “If I get out of the deal, it is [what it is]. I may want to stay there. But I wish it would count.”
André 3000 is currently deep into recording the follow-up to his flute album, although he doesn’t have any idea when it will be released. He claimed he’s got a lot of “creative momentum” and described his latest material as “very interesting,” revealing he’s around halfway into the making of the project.