T-Pain is suing Akon's record label for the second time, claiming Konvict Entertainment LLC still owes him nearly $500,000 in royalties despite a settlement reached just last year. The Atlanta rapper, born Faheem Rashad Najm, filed the lawsuit Friday in Fulton County Superior Court, alleging the label breached both his original 2005 recording agreement and the terms of a 2025 settlement meant to resolve their first legal fight.
According to court filings reported by AJC.com, Konvict Entertainment received $1,304,127 in music royalties in late March 2026 for sales during the second half of 2025. Rather than paying T-Pain his full 75% entitlement, the label allegedly routed half of that sum — $652,063.50 — to an affiliate label called BuVision, leaving T-Pain with a $489,047 payment in June 2026. The lawsuit claims Konvict then directed T-Pain's team to seek the remainder from BuVision itself, according to the same report.
BuVision is not named as a defendant in the case. As reported by AJC.com, the affiliate label was founded by Abou “Bu” Thiam, Akon's brother and a former Konvict Music co-CEO who previously served as Def Jam's Vice President of A&R before becoming Executive Vice President at Columbia Records in 2022, according to Revolt TV. That profile mentions Thiam's involvement with Kanye West, Rihanna, T-Pain, and Lady Gaga.
A Settlement That Didn't Stick
This isn't T-Pain's first trip through Fulton County courts over this exact relationship. His initial lawsuit, filed in June 2018, sought at least $400,000 for unpaid album advances and missing semi-annual royalty accountings tied to his 2017 fifth studio album, *Oblivion* — his final release under Konvict Muzik, the report notes. That case eventually led to a 2025 settlement in which Konvict denied liability but agreed to pay $114,000 after years of court-ordered mediation to clear back royalties through December 2024.
T-Pain's new suit claims Konvict has now breached that very settlement. Faheem Najm alleges the label owes him 75% of net royalties collected from music distributors, a cut he says was guaranteed under both his 2005 recording contract and the 2025 agreement. Konvict Entertainment LLC, co-founded in Georgia by Akon, is the only defendant named in the current case.
A Familiar Playbook for the Auto-Tune Pioneer
T-Pain's relationship with Akon's label stretches back two decades. That relationship produced music during T-Pain's early career.
T-Pain's current legal fight concerns unpaid catalog money.
Georgia's Music Royalty Reckoning
T-Pain's suit lands amid a broader wave of Atlanta music figures turning to the courts over catalog accounting. In July, Jermaine Dupri filed an $18 million breach-of-contract suit against Sony Music Entertainment in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, also centered on disputed catalog royalties. Statute-of-limitations deadlines can shape how aggressively artists must move to recover unpaid sums.
The financial stakes come as T-Pain's broader income picture remains separate from the legal dispute. That distinction doesn't resolve the current dispute, which centers specifically on royalties Konvict collected from distributors rather than the catalog sale itself.
T-Pain has kept a busy community schedule around metro Atlanta and the Southeast even as the legal fight unfolds. Last October he hosted a free 20th-anniversary block party during Florida A&M University's homecoming weekend, part of a run of major regional appearances detailed in Hoodline's prior FAMU homecoming coverage.
