Westside Battles Lara George, Djinee

The CEO of Westside Music, Solomon Arueya, is very pissed at the moment. He is heartbroken and vexed that some of the artistes that have passed through his record label have not been keeping to the terms of their contract. At the moment, he is poised to fight the battle legally to a logical conclusion.
Over the years, artistes like the defunct group; Da Natives, Djinee, Tosin Martins, Freestyle, Niyola, Faze and Lara George have passed through the label. It has not been an all rosy relationship between the artistes and the Solomon Arueya. They all complained at different times that their royalties were not paid; an allegation that Mr. Arueya had always described as untrue and malicious. This was one of the reasons he and Freestyle were almost had at logger heads at the time. Mr. Arueya maintained that there are documents to back up all their transactions. He said the artistes are just un-necessarily ungrateful and greedy.
At this point in time, he is ready to make good his threat that who ever plans to release the albums of Lara George and Djinee are merely wasting their time. He said the albums will never see the light of the day unless they adhere strictly to the terms of disengagement.
Djinee left the label after the success of his hit single, Ego. He declined commenting on his former CEO’s threats saying he had no problems with him. “My album is out already. It hasn’t got everywhere probably due to distribution problem”.
In the case of Lara George, her album release is tentatively scheduled for August 2009. The first single from the album, Ko Le Baje, was released last week. Lara had earlier told This Blog that she was out of the label for good. Some of the reasons were that her debut album was not properly handled.
The CEO of Westside Music, Solomom Arueya, however said he would explore all legal options available to fight the two acts. “It is pertinent to note that Lara George in the existing contract she signed with Westside Music is obligated to do two albums in which she has done just one titled ‘Ijoba Orun’. This action we found most common with Nigerian artistes who do not observe the terms of contract with their record labels and this accounts for the reason foreign record labels are not willing to sign on any Nigerian musician. Most record labels do not even find it essential to conduct a search to know if the musician they are about to sign have any existing and binding contracts elsewhere. The industry sure needs to be properly re-organised. Let everybody be aware that Lara George and DJinee have binding contracts with Westside Music. We won’t join issues with them on the pages of newspapers but will not hesitate to explore all legal options open to us”.