Martin Shkreli is suing RZA over multi-million dollar Wu-Tang Clan album ‘Once Upon A Time In Shaolin’, which he bought in 2015, and was forced to forfeit after legal trouble.
READ MORE: Five things we learned from our ‘In Conversation’ video chat with RZA
Only one copy of the record by Wu-Tang Clan was ever published, and it was available on a CD that came engraved in a nickel and silver box. When it went to auction, it came with the terms and conditions that it could not be released to the general public until the year 2103.
It sold at auction for an impressive $2million, and while the buyer was initially anonymous, it was later revealed to be Martin Shkreli. He bought the album in 2015 – two years before he was involved in the spiking of the price of AIDS drugs, and convicted of securities fraud.
Due to the charges, he had to forfeit the record to prosecutors to help pay the massive restitution sentence.
Then, in 2021, the ‘Shaolin’ album was bought by a company called Pleasr for $4million, and they went on to pay another $750,000 for additional rights to the record in 2024. Since they first acquired it, they have made money off the album by selling extremely limited access and playing it for those who attend private events.
Also in 2024, the company filed a lawsuit against Shkreli after he threatened to release ‘Shaolin’ online. A judge ruled that the case could go to trial, and Shkreli hit back at claims, saying that the company has also shared parts of the album to the public.
Now, Shkreli has also dragged Wu-Tang’s RZA into the lawsuit, alleging that some of the blame for the dispute between him and Pleasr is his fault.
In his claims, Shkreli claims that RZA (real name Robert Diggs) and producer Cilvaringz (real name Tarik Azzougarh) sold the rights to the album to Pleasr in 2024, despite those same rights already being contractually promised to him with the initial 2015 sale.
RZA sued by Martin Shkreli over rare Wu-Tang Clan album https://t.co/Va4kXMTHjn pic.twitter.com/C68rXqDCxV
— Hip Hop Hero (@_HipHopHero) February 4, 2026
His lawyers called it a “duplicate sale” via Billboard, and claimed that an “immediate, real and justiciable controversy exists between Shkreli, PleasrDAO, and the Wu-Tang defendants with respect to the ownership of this future interest”.
The lawyers also said that the 2015 sale gave him 50 per cent of the copyright straight away, and promised him the remaining half in 88 years. This, they claim, means that Wu-Tang sold 150 per cent of rights to the album with the sale to Pleasr.
In retaliation, the legal team for Pleasr accused Shkreli of continually trying to “distract and delay with actions that the Court has consistently and strenuously rejected”. He also shared a statement with Billboard, saying that the claims raised are “untimely” and “non-cognizable”, and that Shkreli could not have held onto the contractual rights due to the court order to forfeit the album.
RZA’s team have not yet spoken publicly about the lawsuit, nor did they respond to Billboard’s request for comment.
When the ‘Shaolin’ album was first purchased by the disgraced pharma mogul in 2015, he later went on to accuse the band of “talking shit behind my back” regarding the sale. Later, RZA said in 2017 that he “respected” Shkreli for helping the album “make history” with the auction sale.
The post Martin Shkreli is suing RZA over multi-million dollar Wu-Tang album ‘Once Upon A Time In Shaolin’ he bought and forfeited appeared first on NME.
