Music boss Carl Crawford has dismissed Megan Thee Stallion's claims he and his label associates are trying to prevent her from releasing new music.
The hip-hop star has won a restraining order against her 1501 label chiefs, claiming they were trying to stop her from dropping new tunes later this week, but former professional baseball star Crawford insists he was never planning to thwart her efforts to give fans music.
And in an interview with Billboard, he insists, "It's a whole lie. Nothing is true that she said. Me being greedy and taking money from her, that's crazy. I never tried to take nothing from her. The only thing we ever did was give, give, give."
Instead, Crawford claims Megan is at fault for failing to pay back money she owed him after signing with JAY-Z's Roc Nation in September (19).
The Hot Girl Summer hitmaker has accused Crawford of forcing her to sign a restrictive contract at the start of her career, but he states the deal was no more binding than any other label's.
"It's a great contract for a first-timer," he adds. "What contract gives parts of their masters and 40 per cent royalties and all that kind of stuff? Ask JAY-Z to pull one of his artists' first contracts, and let's compare it to what Megan got... I guarantee they won't ever show you that."
And the 1501 boss admits he was flabbergasted when Megan attacked him and his label associates in an emotional Instagram post on Sunday (01Mar20), stating, "When I signed, I didn't really know what was in my contract. I was young... So when I got with Roc Nation, I got management, real management. I got real lawyers, and they were like, 'Do you know that this is in your contract?' And I was like, 'Oh damn, that's crazy, no I didn't know'."
"My initial reaction was, 'Man, I can't believe this is serious. She just has so many holes in her story, and it's almost on some delusional type stuff'," Carl explains.
"The bubble of Hollywood and her eight million followers has really clouded her head, because the stuff that she's saying is not true... Now, she fell for the oldest trick in the industry: the conquer and divide theme.
"Everybody in the industry knows this is what JAY-Z and Roc Nation do: They come in, they find the smallest things wrong with the problem... and then she says that I didn't want to negotiate...? This isn't a negotiation. This is a robbery."
