Your Masters and
Don’t Even Know It.
The most common contract clauses unsigned artists sign without understanding — and what they’re actually agreeing to give up forever.
Nobody hands you a contract and says “sign here to give us your music forever.” They hand you a contract full of language that sounds reasonable, legal, even protective — and buried inside it are clauses that will cost you everything you build. Masters. Royalties. Creative control. The right to use your own name. This is the conversation nobody in the industry wants to have with you before you sign.
Your masters are the original recordings of your music. Not the song itself — that’s your publishing — but the specific recording you made. When you own your masters, you decide who uses your music, how it’s used, and you collect the money when it is. When someone else owns your masters, they make those decisions. You just get whatever percentage they agreed to give you — if they agreed to give you anything at all.
Taylor Swift spent years fighting publicly to reclaim her masters. Most unsigned artists don’t even realize they signed them away until it’s too late to do anything about it. The label doesn’t need to steal from you. They just need you to sign a contract you didn’t fully read.
This clause redefines your recording as something you created on behalf of the label — like an employee doing a job. Under this language, the label is legally considered the author of the work. You are not. The recordings are theirs from the moment they’re made, not yours to reclaim after a contract ends.
Under US copyright law, artists have the right to reclaim their masters after 35 years. But that right only exists if you are the legal author of the work. Work-for-hire language eliminates that right entirely. You will never get those recordings back. Not in 35 years. Not ever.
A 360 deal — also called a multiple rights deal — gives the label a percentage of every revenue stream you generate. Not just recorded music. Everything. Touring. Merchandise. Endorsements. Acting. Licensing. Brand deals. Every dollar you earn from your name, your face, and your talent.
Labels justify this by saying they invest in developing artists and deserve a share of the success they helped create. That argument has some logic when the label is actually investing heavily in your career. It has no logic when the label is doing the minimum and taking a cut of the show you booked yourself, the merch you designed yourself, and the sponsorship deal you negotiated yourself.
Look for language that includes phrases like “ancillary rights,” “adjacent revenue,” “touring income,” “merchandise receipts,” or “any and all income derived from Artist’s name, likeness, or performance.” These are the markers of a 360 deal, regardless of what the contract is actually called.
The smaller the label, the more dangerous this clause is. Major labels at least have marketing budgets, distribution infrastructure, and promotion teams that arguably justify some participation in your overall success. A small label offering you a 360 deal has almost nothing to offer you in return for that level of access to your income.
Most artists understand masters in a vague way. Almost none understand publishing. Publishing rights are the rights to the underlying song itself — the melody and the lyrics — as opposed to the master recording. They are separate. They can be sold separately. And a label contract can take both without making it obvious that’s what’s happening.
When your music is licensed for a film, a TV show, a commercial, or a video game, two payments are generated: one for the master recording and one for the underlying composition. If the label owns your publishing, they get their share of both. If you also signed a “co-publishing” deal, they may own up to 50% of the composition itself — the thing you wrote from nothing.
A co-publishing deal transfers a percentage of your publishing ownership — not just the right to collect, but actual ownership of the copyright in the composition. An administration deal only gives the label the right to collect on your behalf, without transferring ownership. These are very different things and the language is often used interchangeably in contracts written to confuse.
A record deal will have a stated term — usually one album or one to two years. What it will also have is option periods. The label has the option — not you, the label — to extend the contract for additional albums or additional years. You do not have that option. They decide when the contract ends.
A contract with five option periods is not a one-album deal. It is potentially a six-album deal. If each album takes two to three years to record, release, and cycle through, you could be contractually bound for fifteen years to a label that has the right to drop you at any time but that you cannot leave.
The key word is “option.” If the contract gives the label the option to extend, renew, or add album commitments — and does not give you an equivalent right to exit — the contract length is entirely in the label’s control. They will exercise options when your career is going well and drop you when it isn’t.
You don’t need to be a lawyer to protect yourself. You need to know what questions to ask — and to insist on clear answers before your pen touches paper.
The best contract is the one you never have to sign. In 2025, an independent artist with a real audience, a direct relationship with their fans, and ownership of their masters is in a stronger position than most signed artists with a label deal and no leverage.
Distribution is solved. Promotion is learnable. Sync licensing is accessible. The things a label used to provide exclusively — distribution, radio, retail — are no longer exclusive. What a label still provides is money, relationships, and reach. Those things have value. But they have a price. Know the price before you agree to pay it.
If a deal is worth taking, it will still be worth taking after a lawyer reviews it. Any label that pressures you to sign without legal counsel is a label that knows what’s in the contract and is hoping you don’t find out until it’s too late.
Your Masters.
Upload your music to Exposed Vocals — free, independent, and with no contracts to sign. Build your presence, get discovered, and stay in control of everything you create.
