A US federal courtroom has handed Common Music Group (UMG) a partial victory in a closely-watched lawsuit introduced by Limp Bizkit and its frontman Fred Durst.
In a ruling on Friday (January 17), the US District Court docket for the Central District of California dismissed elements of the lawsuit that requested the courtroom to nullify three contracts signed within the Nineteen Nineties and 2000 between Limp Bizkit members, Durst’s label Flawless Information and UMG’s Interscope label.
It additionally dismissed Limp Bizkit’s copyright infringement claims towards UMG.
To nullify the contracts would require “a complete failure of efficiency” on the a part of UMG in finishing up these contracts; UMG’s delayed cost of some royalties owed to Limp Bizkit and Flawless Information doesn’t meet that normal, not least as a result of Interscope “paid thousands and thousands” in advances to Limp Bizkit and invested substantial quantities into their music, Decide Percy Anderson wrote in his order, which might be learn in full right here.
Decide Anderson concluded that as a result of the contracts are nonetheless legitimate, there isn’t any motive to rule that UMG violated Limp Bizkit or Flawless Information’ copyrights.
The copyright claims are what would have given the US federal courtroom jurisdiction over the matter, as copyright is a matter of federal legislation. The opposite allegations towards UMG – breach of contract, breach of fiduciary responsibility, fraudulent concealment, promissory fraud, and different expenses – are issues of state legislation.
With out the copyright claims, the federal courtroom doesn’t have jurisdiction to listen to the case. Decide Anderson gave Limp Bizkit’s attorneys till February 3 to amend the criticism to incorporate copyright claims, in any other case, he wrote, he’ll dismiss the remainder of the case.
Nonetheless, Limp Bizkit may nonetheless pursue the remaining allegations in a state courtroom.
Durst, Limp Bizkit, and Flawless Information introduced the case towards UMG final October, asking for $200 million over allegations that UMG had didn’t pay royalties to Durst and Limp Bizkit, regardless of the band having offered greater than 45 million data because it signed within the Nineteen Nineties with California indie Flip Information, with distribution from UMG’s Interscope.
The lawsuit requested the federal courtroom for “rescission” (i.e., nullification) of the contracts between Interscope, Flawless, and Limp Bizkit, in addition to compensation for different artists who labored with UMG via Flawless Information.
Amongst different claims, Durst’s attorneys alleged that UMG had “designed and applied royalty software program and methods that have been intentionally designed to hide artists’ (together with Plaintiffs’) royalties and preserve these income for itself,” including that this will likely have affected “presumably a whole lot of different artists who’ve unfairly had their royalties wrongfully withheld for years.”
Based on the criticism, in April 2024, a enterprise supervisor for Limp Bizkit contacted UMG, alleging that Durst and the opposite band members hadn’t been paid royalties, and requested for entry to UMG’s portal to view royalty statements. The supervisor discovered somewhat over $1 million in unpaid royalties to the band, and solely after that did UMG request cost information for the band members and switch the cash to them, together with some $2.4 million owed to Flawless Information.
In a movement to dismiss the case, filed final November, UMG disputed that declare, asserting that an exec within the Royalties Division had reached out to the enterprise supervisor a 12 months earlier and suggested him of the necessity to “arrange a vendor profile for Limp Bizkit” in order that the corporate may “begin making royalty funds” to the band.
UMG argued that this “eviscerates [the] declare” that it had stored silent about Limp Bizkit’s royalties till after the enterprise supervisor started wanting into the matter.Music Enterprise Worldwide
