Hip-hop star Kanye West and Tidal, the music-streamer controlled by Jay Z , duped music fans into subscribing to the $9.99 a month service, one music fan claimed in a lawsuit filed on Monday.
Justin Baker-Rhett is angry because he forked over the cash to Tidal so he could listen to West’s “The Life of Pablo” album because the artist promised that was the only place it would ever be available, the suit claims.
“My album will never, never, never be on Apple and it will never be for sale. You can only get it on Tidal,” West tweeted on Feb. 14, according to the suit.
That tweet help jack up Tidal subscribers from 1 million to 3 million. “The Life of Pablo” was streamed 250 million times.
But West reneged on that promise and “TLOP” is now currently widely available on other streaming services.
Baker-Rhett claims that Kanye’s representations — as a part owner of Tidal — break California’s false advertising laws and amount to unfair competition, according to the suit, filed in San Francisco federal court.
The suit also claims “fraudulent inducement” and “unjust richment.”
The suit, which seeks class-action status, seeks unspecified financial damages. It also seeks to force Tidal to erase any personal information it has on his account.
Such personal info — from Baker-Rhett and others allegedly harmed — could be worth as much as $84 million to Tidal, the suit claims.
“Consumers were uniformly tricked into handing over the private data and credit card information by a singular mistruth,” the suits claims.
Baker-Rhett is also suing S. Carter Enterprises, a company controlled by Jay Z, whose real name is Sean Carter.
Tidal did not immediately return a call for comment.


