Erica Banks may have recently left her label 1501 Certified Entertainment, but the label’s founder, former MLB player Carl Crawford, insists that he was really the victim of shady business practices, not the perpetrator. During an Instagram Live stream, Crawford argued that he’s the one who is in debt to Warner Music Group after Banks’ departure, which he blamed on her following Megan Thee Stallion’s example.
According to AllHipHop, during the stream, Crawford said, “Erica’s not even making no money for me to take… I was just as surprised as y’all [were] to hear we’re greedy and stealing money. I’m still trying to figure that one out because last I checked we’re $500,000 in the hole with Warner. That’s all I know. So who owes who money?”
He also referenced Meg, with whom 1501 has been engaged in a years-long legal battle, saying, “The only reason why the one’s doing it is because the other one did it, so if the first one hadn’t took this route, the second wouldn’t have took this route. They only follow each other.”
The first indications that Banks was also feuding with the label came with a late-June snippet of her new song “Real Rap B*tch.” In it, she raps, “Give a f*ck about that label they see me / And they owe me some money, they greedy.” The full song was released this past weekend on YouTube.
Megan Thee Stallion sued 1501 in 2020 after the label refused to release her from or renegotiate her contract and tried to block her from releasing new music. Since then, the dispute has only grown more contentious, with Meg recently accusing the label of hiding money to keep from paying her royalties.
Erica Banks is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.