Viral UK R&B single Shotta's signs seven-figure label deal
London indie label Isekai Records and New York label broke Records have signed a seven-figure deal for Shotta's, a single by UK R&B artist Season 25. The labels announced the agreement in a report published on 12 November, and Music Business Worldwide reported it the same day.
A seven-figure deal is one worth at least a million, in whatever currency it was struck. The labels say it is believed to be one of the largest single-song agreements in UK music history.
The song began life outside the major labels. Shotta's was released independently through TuneCore, a service that lets artists put music on streaming platforms without a label, on 25 September. It was produced by Tobiswag and Katzy.
Its growth came largely through short videos. According to the labels, the song has been used in more than 150,000 TikTok videos, and its main sound, the audio clip creators attach to their posts, has passed 116 million views.
On the charts, the track spent four weeks at No. 1 on the Official R&B UK Chart, compiled by the Official Charts Company. It also spent four weeks in the Top 40 of the Official Singles Chart, the UK's main singles chart, peaking at No. 30.
Streaming figures were strong too. As of 25 October, the labels said, Shotta's was generating 1.4 million streams a day. A stream is one play counted by a platform. At the same point, Season 25 had 1.43 million monthly listeners on Spotify, meaning the number of different people who played the artist's music in the previous month. The song reached No. 2 on Spotify's chart in Germany and has charted in more than 18 countries.
Apple Music credits the sound recording, the original master audio, to Octo Blue Limited under an exclusive licence to Isekai Records and broke Records. An exclusive licence lets the labels release and sell the recording while the rights holder keeps ownership.
broke Records was co-founded in 2023 by Andre Benz and Brandon De Oliveira. It operates within Create Music Group's portfolio of companies.
For the artist, the deal moves a song that first reached listeners on its own into the hands of two labels that will handle its next stage. The terms of the agreement, including what the seven figures cover, have not been set out in detail publicly.
