T-Pain says the people who took a cut of his No. 1 hit "Buy U A Drank" were making 8 cents every three months. He was making $100,000 a night performing it.
In the video below, he tells Shannon Sharpe how that happened, and how a $1.7 million Bugatti ate the last of his money.
The song hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2007. T-Pain worked in a line from Lil Scrappy and a piece of a Lil Jon record. He says he was "paying homage."
Then their publishing companies came for a share of the publishing and the masters.
"So while they were making eight cents every three months, I was making 100 grand a night off of performing it."
"Be greedy, but you're not gonna get what I'm doing."
The money from the song didn't stay with him either. Shannon brings up the Bugatti he bought early in his career for $1.7 million.
"When I bought that Bugatti, that was the last bit of my money and I had no idea."
His accountants told him they might have to sell his house. He said it was paid for. They said "not anymore."
He says people around him were stealing, and he didn't care. "I had so much money that it was just like, why would I care?"
Then his granddad pitched him pants with the boxers already sagging out. T-Pain gave him $150,000 he didn't have. His granddad never made a single pair. T-Pain says Balenciaga sells them now.
In September, T-Pain sued Akon's label Konvict for $489,047 in royalties he says it owes him, the AJC reported.
The case for the publishers: T-Pain used lines from their songs, and that usually means splitting the rights.
So should the people whose lines he borrowed get a cut of "Buy U A Drank"?
My wife @PainzGirl is a vet so we went on a date to see the Blue Angels ✈️ Shout out to them for one upping me on my own date 😂 Happy Veterans Day everybody!
Still in shock😳😱🔥😭 I got the opportunity to perform my song To Be A Man in the new @tylerperry movie “The Gospel Of Christmas” that just dropped TODAY on @netflix with @TheRealTank 🙏🏾😳🔥 This movie is going to make an IMPACT! This is a day i’ll truly never forget! Go watch the full movie on Netflix for ya boi! God is good! What y’all think?! #tylerperry #dax #tank #netflix #movie
@BamaSmith112@CoachSmook "Nobody" except for you. You took time out of your day to tell someone you "don't care about" that no one cares what they think. I'm sure you don't see the irony in this. You're commenting from a page created last month when you could just man up and comment from your main page.