A Tribe Called Quest is currently trying to retrieve a share of their sound recording royalties that was recently auctioned off as an NFT.
In late June, it was announced that an NFT made up of the sound recording royalties from the first five A Tribe Called Quest albums was being auctioned off. A report from Billboard stated that the NFT — derived from a 1.5% share of the group’s sound recording royalties — was being auctioned off by online music royalties marketplace Royalty Exchange. A day later, the NFT had been sold for almost $85,000.

Because of how the news was presented, it seemed as if the beloved hip-hop group was involved in the process. This turned out not to be the case. Co-founding member Ali Shaheed Muhammad addressed the NFT sale in a lengthy Facebook post. He shared how Ed Chalpin — the owner of music company PPX Enterprises — had added an unfair clause in their agreement deal with Jive Records when they signed to the label. The clause added was that Chalpin and entertainment attorney Ron Skoler would “get paid a percentage of our recording fund EVERY time we commenced to record a new album,” according to Muhammad’s post. According to a 1992 article from Billboard, Chalpin was supposed to receive “15% of the group’s earnings for the term of its recording contract at Zomba/Jive in return for Chalpin having negotiated the contract.”

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