Wiz Khalifa Producer Says Atlantic Calls Albums Mixtapes To Avoid Paying Producers

E. Dan is one-third of the Pittsburgh-based engineering and production team ID Labs, who are known for their work with Wiz Khalifa and Mac Miller.

Dan just did a Beatz Star interview in which he explained how Atlantic records has been exploiting the continuously blurring line between mixtapes and albums to not pay producers their usual fee.

Dan used the example of working on Atlantic signee Snow Tha Product's 2013 project A Good Nights & Bad Mornings 2: The Hangover.

"They called it a mixtape," E. Dan said. "They didn't treat it like it was an album, which is just their way of not paying me a whole lot."

He said Atlantic did the same thing with Wiz Khalifa's 2016 "compilation album" Khalifa, on which ID Labs had five tracks. 

 "The Khalifa album, I don't know what they called it, a 'street album'? They came up with some really clever name that essentially meant, 'Everyone involved, you're going to get paid half what you normally do.' I've seen it happen often over the last few years. Anything to save a buck for these labels."

You can check the interview below. Dan discusses Atlantic's classification shadiness toward the end. In the first part, he speaks about feeling pushed out when Wiz signed with Atlantic and having Wiz make sure he still got his beats placed.

.@WizKhalifa's producer E. Dan (@IdlabsMusic) explains how record labels avoid paying producers + how Wiz' loyalty got him beat placements 💯

Exclusive interview with @DJPain1 + @BeatStars 🙌🏽 pic.twitter.com/qAgm430dE5

— BeatStars (@BeatStars) January 2, 2018