This was an e-mail I received today from TTD's Webmaster. It is written by TTD. Prince is mentioned in the third paragraph from the end. I thought Prince fans would be interested because TTD just dropped his recent record deal with Sony, he carries similar view on the Record Industry as Prince. Read on:

Subject: Sananda's Re-sure-actions!

Dearest compadres,

One of the reasons I’ve come to my full senses and decided to sever all ties with the octopus that is Universal records (specifically Universal Germany) is because I discovered that they were illegally shipping my records into unlicensed territories behind my back and profiting from them .

Yet the industry are the first to conveniently pin the blame on ‘pirates’ when they are routinely the biggest pirates artists have to deal with every day .

This act of course is just the tip of the iceberg and is why they prefer to deal with young artists with more stars in their eyes than sand in their shoes who are ‘looked after’ by managers who function as apologists for the industry, by business managers who are themselves skillful at hiding things and discouraging the ‘wrong’ questions and by lawyers who are loyal to the industry that will continue to feed them as long as they play ball .

It is understood by these men that by and large artists have a shelf life of 3 to 5 years as long as they smile or emote for the camera and don’t ask any intelligent questions and who are supposed to be content with the once in a life time opportunity they are given to be on tv and seen by the ‘homies’ back in the ‘hood’ , work with top producers hoisted upon them whether they fit or not, hang out with supermodels or other various starlets and allow themselves to be drained by the vampires of the industry until they actually have something to say or until the wrinkles show through all the strain.

Sony during my nightmarish experience with them (for I did not sign to Sony, I signed to Columbia and was not given a choice when the bigger fish swallowed the smaller fish )

screwed me so deeply (and then internally laughed about it as they were wiping the blood from the blade) that for a while I couldn’t see past my own trauma and by the time the wound in my back had healed I was finally able after an 8 year tug of war to free myself from their grossly immoral ‘standard’ contract simply because they, in their infinite wisdom, assumed that I had nothing left and wouldn’t embarrass them with success elsewhere, after defaming my name with reports of destructive activities and other outright lies and gross exaggerations .

All of this to keep one of their other artists happy, who of course himself buckled under the strain of then having to make up in the balance sheet for two careers : his and mine ( and the poor thing was already under a great deal of pressure already).

In the mean time shadowed in the dungeon of their Darth Vader like empire I continued to count my blessings , nurture my wounds and hone my craft whilst they continued to Count Dracula .

Artists are routinely screwed and expected to just be grateful for the crumbs that are begrudgingly passed on after everything has been charged back to them anyway , due to the smug assumpion that we have no other choice and even what is contractually owed to us is often withheld and later enticingly presented as an ‘advance’ on future work obligating us to them even longer when it was in fact money owed to you anyway.

Their ‘books’ are a mockery, they are allowed enough time to hide whatever was not already hidden and you are expected to pay in order to audit them (as well as risk being ostracized by the company).

The law allows them to get away with it as they cry the same tired refrain about financial risks when it’s a fact that once you have a distribution network a certain amount is required anyway just to keep it operational and paying for itself .

They are also allowed to get away with it because they have a lobby and we have not .

For the most part and with all due respect to the exceptions , they are pirates and leeches to their core and their end (such as they now exist) is in sight .

{{{All praises be to Prince , George Michael , Courtney Love, Chuck D, Alanis Morrisette and other brave soldiers who have sacrificed a great deal of their careers in order to help liberate the slaves and grant us all a more equitable piece of the pie that we bake in the ovens of our passion and in the interest of bringing more of God’s light and truth into the hearts of humanity, since without the artists they have nothing to promote except the sound of their own bullshit .}}}

As it now stands record company accountants are far more creative than their artists are allowed to be .

There is a new blade in the guillotine and it is getting sharper by the day and will be coming to you more directly , no longer under the illusion, that in order to get what belongs to us, we have to go through robbers in pinstripes in order to receive it.


Stay tuned

Your eternal friend

Sananda Maitreya

also on behalf of Terence Trent D’Arby
Website: http://www.sanandapromotion.com/

Hai!

so true go on TTD ....
i hope a lot of you guys get to see this...its SOOOOO true...
but what can you do??? as a new "poor" artist . of course you need the big $ corperation behind you.
it takes money to make money...
the biz SUCKS !!!

Anyone who works for someone else's profit is basically a slave. You're selling your labor-power. Your life's energy is going to make some one else richer.

Whats up with the name at the end?

DAYUM--terence is heated!!!

I hope this means now more of TTD's music will be more accessible in the the future.

So, has TTD changed his name to Sananda? If so, why?

Hey... I already posted this! Didn't realize it should have been a news item... At least more people get to see it this way.


Lookie here for a little more discussion on this topic
http://www.prince.org/msg...&tid=11301

Peace

Yeeeaaahhh....Booooyyeee!

So, extremely truth spoken!

But....the big 5 is goin' down. And when they fall it will be hard.


Peace &B Wild

Out.

...and the TTD album Wild Card is SOOOOO good too. Any self-respecting Prince fan should get a copy of this and all TTDs albums. (and perhaps Prince himself should take note too, for the albums are Damn Fine!).

M

i hope that a copy of this was sent 2 paisley park...

Lawd i hate all these pirates in pin stripes. A girl at my work is a session singer, a producer make a track with her on it, he sold it 2 musicmaker 4 £70,000. He made £30,000 and she made £150.

Even producers r bullsh@t.

We can always agree or disagree of what the Music Buseness is about.But that I'm not going 2 get in2 it NOW!
Theo I would like 2 thank TTD 4 the B-Day surpsise...4 songs.
Downlaod them Now!!!!
Like the Wild Card Album & 2 have these 4 songs.Like Prince there is manny remixs,outakes,demo,promo...un-cut stuff.This is where I hear how the music emergous from the heart & soul!

Go Sananda! Tell the truth!

Sananda changed his around the same time that Prince. He didn't intend at the time to use the name professionally.

TTD's The Wild Card was released for free 1 year ago this week and as you've read above release in Europe.

In the States it's about $30. It is the most perfectly eclectic piece of work I own.

And I agree that all Prince fans should really revisit his work, not bullshit interviews that happened 15 years ago. It was all hype, yall are Prince fans you should be used to it.

Each project is an evolution of TTD. Not only can he sing like an angel, literally (5 octave range) he can rock hard in any funky place..

I had hoped that Prince would invite Sananda to the Celebration last year, if for no other reason than to show solidarity for artist striving for independence, yet it was not meant to be.

It would be so great for those two to collaborate. Prince's innovations and Sananda's nuances would yield something truly divine, I think.

~Adore

~Slaying my dragons by trying to Love them~ TTD