Tommy Boy Decides Not To Release De La Soul's Digital Catalogue After Boycott Called

So Tommy Boy won't be releasing De La Soul's digital catalog tomorrow after all.

The label made the announcement to Variety today after De La told their fans they'd only be getting 10 percent of sales from the digital release and Tommy Boy 90 percent. The group also said Tommy Boy still hasn't cleared all the samples from their catalog, and they worried they would be held liable for the uncleared samples

Tommy Boy's sudden 180 comes after Questlove called for a boycott of the label, which was supported by  Nas, A Tribe Called Quest's Jarobi and Pete Rock.

“Because Tommy Boy has not had the opportunity to sit down together with De La Soul and finalize our negotiations — something we’ve wanted to do for months — we have decided to postpone the digital release of their catalog scheduled for tomorrow,” a statement reads. “We know fans are eager to hear these amazing recordings and we are hopeful for a quick resolution.”

De La member Maseo spoke about the boycott and said it happened on its own.

“Let me tell you what’s crazy,” he explained. “We flirted with the idea of a boycott for a long time,  for about a good month-and-a-half. It’s crazy, Questlove came out of the blue with that. We honestly wanted to be really clear on it being a boycott. It just sat there on our tongue. We were like, ‘What the f**k do we do!?’"

“We legally can’t fight and can’t afford to fight," added Maseo. "We ended up refraining from that. Tom [Silverman] can legally do this. It’s pretty much turned into a protest to us and a boycott for the fans. The boycott manifested on its own. It had been up to this point just a protest.”

De La also posted a message about the renegotiation and said Tommy Boy wanted them to sign a confidentiality agreement first.

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Your voice is a tool that you sometimes have to use as the weapon to defend yourself. You want me to leave my weapon home? #respectourlegacy #respecttheculture #dotherightthing #tommyboycott #delasoul

A post shared by De La Soul (@wearedelasoul) on Feb 28, 2019 at 10:04am PST

Do you think De La will get a fair percentage split after all of this?