Scooter BraunPhoto: Tasos Katopodis / Getty Images Entertainment / Getty Images
Scooter Braun is finally opening up (again) about his infamous fallout with Taylor Swift — and this time, he’s calling her the “biggest artist of all time.”
On the July 17 episode of the Question Everything podcast with Danielle Robay, Braun reflected on the long-standing tension between him and Swift. If you need a refresher, the drama started in 2019 when Braun purchased Big Machine Records, acquiring the rights to Swift’s first six albums. Swift wasn’t shy about her feelings at the time, calling the deal “incessant, manipulative bullying” in a Tumblr post and later claiming Braun wouldn’t sell the masters back unless she signed an NDA.
Braun said in the interview that he was under an NDA himself during negotiations and suggests Swift may not have been told the full picture by her team. “When Taylor says that she wasn’t offered the masters, the reason I was under NDA was because we were in negotiations to sell it back to her. I just choose to believe her that maybe [her team] didn’t tell her.”
While reflecting, Braun said his main regret is that the situation played out so publicly without a personal conversation between them. “It’s easy to see someone as a monster if you never meet them,” he said, adding that he and Swift have only met three times. At the time of the original catalog sale, he was managing Kanye West and Justin Bieber — two artists Swift had famously clashed with — and believes that may have shaped her view of him.
Still, Braun believes “everyone in the end won.” After Swift passed on buying her masters, she began to reclaim control of her work by re-recording her early albums through her Taylor’s Version series. The project boosted interest in her original catalog and helped fuel her record-breaking Eras Tour, which ultimately led her to becoming a billionaire. In May, she finally acquired her original masters from Shamrock Holdings — the company Braun sold them to after Swift declined to buy.
“She did incredibly well and basically had the biggest moment of her career,” he said, even calling her the “biggest artist of all time.” He also admitted that the spike in value of her old masters — driven by the popularity of her re-recordings — worked out financially on his end too.
As for whether Swift’s track “Vigilante Sh*t” was aimed at him — particularly the line “thick as thieves with your ex-wife” — Braun laughed it off. “No, ’cause I talk to Yael every day,” he said, referring to his ex-wife Yael Cohen. “That’s like my partner…That’s the mother of my children… So no, I never thought that was about us,”
Though the two still seem to be on opposite sides of the story, Braun’s latest comments show at least some appreciation — and a bit of reflection — on one of music’s messiest breakups.
SOURCE: Billboard