R. Kelly, a renowned US R&B musician now serving a 30-year sentence for sex charges, released a previously unheard album on Friday through Spotify and Apple Music. The audio was dubbed a bootleg by the music press.
The celebrity entertainment website TMZ broke the news of the album’s release, which goes by the name “I Admit It.”
It had 13 songs, including the 19-minute title track, which was released on SoundCloud in 2018 prior to Kelly’s conviction for committing sex offenses against adolescent females and creating child pornography.
Following the original accusations by TMZ and the Hollywood Reporter, the CD was no longer offered on either music service. Spotify did not reply to an AFP request for comment.
When questioned by Variety, a spokesman for Sony Music, the company in charge of Kelly’s musical rights, said that the album had only been temporarily and clandestinely made public, indicating that it had been a bootleg.
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Kelly’s attorney, Jennifer Bonjean, told Variety that her client “is having intellectual property stolen from him” and that neither the singer nor his entourage was responsible for this release.
The musician was found guilty in September 2021 in a New York court of orchestrating a “system” of sexual exploitation of young women for three decades, including underage females. The singer is well-known internationally for his popular song “I Believe I Can Fly” and has sold 75 million CDs.
The federal court in Brooklyn sentenced him to 30 years in prison for these sexual offenses.
He was convicted guilty of creating child pornography and stealing from a kid by a Chicago, Illinois, court in September.
Federal prosecutors in Illinois said he may be given a sentence of 10 to 90 years in prison.
Due to the fact that Black women made up the bulk of the plaintiffs in the case, the claims against Kelly were considered as a significant turning point in the #MeToo movement.
Kelly’s illustrious career had long been marred by rumors and allegations of sexual assault. With cash agreements that contained secrecy terms, he had long since succeeded in silencing them.