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SOURCE: stereogum.com
Little Simz is suing her former producer Dean Cover, aka Inflo (who also helms the music collective SAULT), for allegedly failing to repay loans totaling $2.2 million related to a performance and unlawfully retaining funds reserved for album recording expense.
The UK rapper whose real name is Simbiatu Ajikawo filed a claim in January, accusing him of holding onto loans she had made to him for over a year and not properly accounting for funds provided by a Sony unit to cover recording expense, per Law360.
In April 2022, Ajikawo began to be managed by an employee of Cover’s company Forever Living Originals Ltd. after departing from her previous manager, Robert Swerdlow of the Starwood Music Group Ltd. Cover advised she not continue her contract with Universal Music Publishing when her songwriter contract ended, suggesting she self-publish her music instead.
Her last three albums were shared via Artists Without A Label, a unit of Sony Music Entertainment known as AWAL which provides distribution and marketing services to musical artists who self-publish. In November 2022, she entered an agreement with AWAL, receiving a total advance of £2 million on delivery of three albums, plus £625,000 for recording costs of the third album.
She paid Cover £350,000 and £275,000 through a Forever Living Originals bank account before receiving the recording costs payment in order to cover recording costs for the third album with AWAL. Her claim says she believed any funds not spent on recording costs would be returned to her once the album was done. In an October 2024 letter to Ajikawo’s lawyers, Cover’s solicitors allegedly produced an account of the recording costs for that album, amounting only to £524,436.
In December 2023 Cover organized the first and only SAULT show in Drumsheds in London, and Ajikawo offered to lend him £1 million on Dec. 1 to make sure the event would happen. The condition was that he had to repay it on Dec. 4. According to the suit, he failed to do so, saying he was “still getting [his] deal over the line” and would “send [the money] back as soon as it lands.” That same month, she lent him £500,000 and an additional £200,000.
In January 2024, Ajikawo was unable to pay her full tax liability due to Cover’s failure to pay her back, the suit says. Therefore, she incurred interest and charges. In an October 2024 letter, Cover’s legal counsel allegedly acknowledged the debt, but wrongly attributed it to Forever Living Originals rather than Cover personally.
Cover produced 2019’s GREY Area, 2021’s Sometimes I Might Be Introvert, and 2022’s No Thank You. He has not yet filed a defense to the claim.
