Ms. Lauryn Hill released a statement today on Instagram offering a message of support for the California bill the FAIR Act. If signed into law, the bill would repeal an amendment to California’s “Seven-Year Statute” that makes it so record labels can sue artists for damages if they leave after seven years but before fulfilling the required number of albums outlined in their contract.
“Artists can easily fall prey to the internal politics of business, someone inside simply not liking them, or bullying and intimidation and the attacks that come when someone resists that coercion,” Hill writes. “Music is a most powerful medium. Often people want to influence the influencers and will top at nothing less than treachery to accomplish their goal. Greed often perverts the creative intentions of young dreamers who don’t realize they’re up against a system with a history of using and crushing people who don’t comply with their agenda.”
“No institution should be allowed the opportunity to control the market by controlling the output of a creative being for some ridiculous, indefinite period of time,” Hill continued. “This is not only unjust, it’s dangerous, and at its core a violation of the principles of free expression. Artists’ expressions are their voices, and an extension of their free speech and should not be contained, caught-up or controlled beyond a reasonable amount of time by an institution with the money and power to obstruct and deny someone’s output indefinitely.”
A hearing on April 19 will put the bill up for a vote by the Arts Committee, and if it passes there, it will heard by an Appropriations Committee before moving to the assembly floor and state senate.
Hill reunited with the Fugees last year, but a planned reunion tour was scrapped due to COVID-19. Read about the New York performance in “The Fugees’ Reunion Show Felt Like a Miracle” on the Pitch.
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