2011 – Two years since Michael jackson Passed and he tops earnings for Dead Rock Stars on This Day in Rock Music History. Elvis is up on the list as well. John Lennon was No. 5 with $12 mill. Ah… that Magical Mystery Tour.
It’s been two years since Michael Jackson passed away at the age of 50 but the King of Pop’s earning power shows no sign of waning. For the second year in a row, Jackson tops our annual list of the Top-Earning Dead Celebrities. Over the past 12 months Jackson’s estate brought in $170 million from sales of his music and his stake in the Sony/ATV catalog. That’s a big drop from the $275 million Jackson earned in the previous 12 months but it’s still enough to make him the second highest-earning pop act over the past year, dead or alive, after U2.
The Cirque show “Viva Elvis” helped Elvis Presley rank second on our list with $55 million. Of course Presley’s iconic songs, like “Hound Dog ” and ”Heartbreak Hotel,” still sell well and fans flock to Graceland. But a long-running Vegas show where tickets sell for as much as $175 a pop definitely gooses earnings. John Lennon, who ties for fifth on our list with $12 million, and George Harrison, tied for 13th with $6 million, both also benefited from Cirque. The show “Love,” based on Beatles music, has been running at The Mirage in Las Vegas since 2006.
2011 – lyricist Jerry Leiber dies at age 78 on This Day in Rock! He Co-wrote hits like “Hound Dog” and “Jailhouse Rock” and was a key player in the birth or Rock ‘n’ Roll. Composing over 200 tunes covered by Elvis, Buddy Holly, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, James Brown, BB King, The drifters and Peggy Lee, Elvis having recorded over 20 of the tunes himself.
2011 – Artists who had hits in 1978 maybe able to claim Copyrights back on This Day in Rock! Billy Joel, Bryan Adams, Tom Waits, Tom Petty, and Bob Dylan are just a few of the artists who may have rights to their own work from record Companies.
A change in the copyright law in the 70′s allows artists to reapply for the full copyright with a 2 year application before the 35 years are up. Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Loretta Lynn, Tom Waits and Bryan Adams, have already filed to reclaim qualifying works, according to records at the United States Copyright Office.
2011 – Lady Gaga is being sued for copyright infringement for “Judas” on This Day in Rock! A Chicago based singer and songwriter, Rebecca Francescatti, accused Lady Gaga of lifting portions of a similar tune called “Juda”, which was recorded in 1999.
Francescatti’s “Juda” was engineered by Brian Joseph Gaynor, a member of DJ White Shadow, which worked with Lady Gaga on her new album “Born This Way.”
2011 – Judge orders Jobs to answer iTunes questions on This Day in Rock!
Apple Inc. Chief Executive Steve Jobs, who is out on medical leave, has been ordered by a federal magistrate to answer questions from plaintiffs’ lawyers in an antitrust lawsuit related to his company’s iTunes business.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Howard Lloyd, based in San Jose, California, ruled that lawyers representing the plaintiffs in the suit may question Jobs for a total of two hours. He issued the ruling on Monday.
Apple could appeal the ruling to a district judge, but it would likely have to make a case that the magistrate “made a big mistake,” said Professor David Levine at University of California Hastings College of the Law.
An Apple spokeswoman declined to comment, and attorneys for the plaintiffs did not respond to requests for comment.
In the class-action lawsuit, a group of consumers say Apple created a music-downloading monopoly with its iPod player and iTunes store. At issue is a piece of software called Fairplay that allowed only music bought on iTunes to be played on the iPod, according to the complaint.
One competitor, RealNetworks Inc, responded in 2004 by introducing a new technology that would allow customers to play music downloaded from its site on their iPods. Apple quickly announced a software upgrade to iTunes that once more blocked music from RealNetworks, the complaint charges.
“The court finds that Jobs has unique, non-repetitive, first hand knowledge about Apple’s software updates in October 2004 that rendered the RealNetworks’s digital music files once again inoperable with iPods,” Lloyd wrote in his ruling.
The ruling comes amid intense questions about Jobs’ health and whereabouts. Earlier this month an energetic but thin Jobs resurfaced to unveil Apple’s new iPad. His appearance helped reassure investors and fans worried about what his absence might mean for the company.
Apple failed to provide specific examples of how a deposition of Jobs would constitute “undue hardship,” the plaintiffs wrote in a court filing last December.
Lloyd said the deposition of Jobs would be limited to questions about the back-and-forth with RealNetworks in 2004. Apple had sought to prevent the deposition altogether, while the plaintiffs asked to be allowed a broader inquiry.
“By limiting the scope of the deposition, the judge is trying to avoid using this as some sort of tool for embarrassment or annoyance,” Levine said.
Should a district judge uphold Lloyd’s ruling, Levine said it would be extremely difficult for either side to appeal further.
The case is in re Apple iPod iTunes antitrust litigation, Case No. 05-00037, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California.
Apple is involved in a host of other lawsuits, both as a plaintiff and defendant, ranging from disputes over patents to antitrust allegations. On Monday, Apple sued Amazon.com Inc in a bid to stop the online retailer from improperly using its APP STORE trademark, according to a court filing.
(Reporting by Paul Thomasch in New York, Dan Levine in San Francisco and Sakthi Prasad in Bangalore; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick and Derek Caney)
2011 – LimeWire wins limit on damages to record labels on This Day in Rock!
A federal judge limited the potential financial liability facing the operator of LimeWire, a once-popular file-sharing service found liable for copyright infringement, at an upcoming damages trial.
Rejecting an argument that could have led to “trillions” of dollars in damages, U.S. District Judge Kimba Wood agreed with Lime Group LLC that the 13 record companies whose works were infringed by LimeWire deserve one award per work infringed.
The record labels had argued they deserved one award for each infringement by individual LimeWire users. Sony Corp and Vivendi SA own various of the labels.
Wood’s ruling allows the labels to recover between $7.5 million and $1.5 billion of “statutory” damages from New York-based Lime Group and other defendants, including LimeWire founder Mark Gorton.
This sum is based on $750 to $150,000 of possible damages for each of roughly 10,000 post-1972 recordings infringed through LimeWire. The labels are also entitled to “actual” damages for infringement of about 1,000 earlier works.
The 13 record companies include Arista, Atlantic, BMG Music, Capital, Elektra, Interscope, Laface, Motown, Priority, Sony BMG, UMG, Virgin and Warner Brothers, court records show.
THOMAS EDISON
Wood said that had she accepted the labels’ theory of damages, Lime Group could have been on the hook for trillions of dollars, citing the “thousands (or even millions)” of uploads and downloads that took place over several years.
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“Plaintiffs are suggesting an award that is more money than the entire music recording industry has made since Edison’s invention of the phonograph in 1877,” Wood wrote, citing a Lime Group court filing referring to the inventor Thomas Edison. She called this an “absurd result.”
Wood had found last May that Lime Group wrongfully assisted users in pirating digital recordings. She shut down LimeWire in October. A trial on damages is scheduled for May 2.
A spokesman for the Recording Industry Association of America, a trade group for the record companies, had no immediate comment on the ruling.
Joseph Baio, a partner at Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP representing Lime Group, said: “We’re pleased the court accepted the logical theory that recovery is based on infringements per work.”
On Monday, Lime Group settled a separate copyright lawsuit brought by more than 30 music publishers.
Record companies own copyrights to recordings while publishers can own copyrights to the songs themselves.
The case is Arista Records LLC et al v Lime Group et al, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 06-05936.
(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; editing by Andre Grenon, Phil Berlowitz)
All the facts about rock hisory you need in one easy place. With a database of over 25,000 records and growing daily, we update posts about Elvis, the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, the Doors, Jet, My Chemical Romance and many more. We include Video from YouTube, lyrics, and all the juicy facts that happen to your favorite stars. Tell you friends, leave comments, and enjoy history.
2011 – Rockers Motley Crue have been hit with a copyright infringement lawsuit claiming the band’s ‘Too Fast For Love’ album cover was used on merchandise.
Live Nation and the band are being sued by Ron Toma, who claims he owns the rights to the photograph, presumably taken by Michael Pinter in 1981. Showing a close-up of a man wearing a belt and leather trousers.
This image appeared on sweatshirts sold on the band’s website, and Toma has filed papers in Illinois Northern District Court accusing both Live Nation and Motley Crue of using the image without permission. Reported by TMZ.com.
Toma is asking that an order be drawn to prevent the parties from using the image without prior notice.
Meanwhile, Vince Neil will serve a 2 week sentence for a DUI in Vegas… Wha?
2010 – Tesla’s Frank Hannon accuses GN’R or plagiarism.
Did GUNS N’ ROSES Rip Off TESLA? Jeff Keith And Frank Hannon To Guest On That Metal Show This Saturday; Preview Available
Rock Hard
Posted on Thursday, November 11, 2010 at 14:21:00 EST
TESLA frontman Jeff Keith and guitarist Frank Hannon are scheduled to appear on the Saturday, November 13th episode of VH1 Classic’s That Metal Show, hosted by Eddie Trunk, Jim Florentine and Don Jamieson. That Metal Show airs Saturdays at 11 PM ET/PT.
A sneak peek of the new episode can be seen below.
Frank Hannon explaining to everyone that the GUNS N’ ROSES song ‘Patience’ was a rip off of a Tesla demo called ‘Better Off Without You’:
Frank Hannon: “Let me tell you something: ‘Patience’, we were label mates with Guns N’ Roses on Geffen, there’s a demo of a song that we wrote called ‘Better Off Without You’. It is ‘Patience’ note for note.”
Audience: “WOOOOAHHH.”
Eddie Trunk: “Sue their asses”
Don Jamieson: “Breaking news on That Metal Show.”
Jim Florentine: “And I got something else, he whistled on the song dude. You don’t whistle on a song, you sing a song.”
2009 – Procol Harum organist Matthew Fisher is officially recognized as a co-writer on ‘Whiter Shade of Pale.’ on This Day in Rock! The court ruled that Fisher was entitled to a share of royalties based on he writing the song’s organ melody… The most distinctive part of the song.
In 2006 the High court Ruled he deserved 40% of the Copyrights… but, in 2008 it was overturned because he waited too long to report it. 38 years… hmmmm… still shouldn’t matter.. tired of loopholes.
2001 – Beach Boys member Al Jardine went to court in a bid to sue his former band mates, claiming he had been frozen out of the Beach Boys. The $4 million (£2.35 million) suit was filed against Mike Love, Brian Wilson, the Carl Wilson Trust and Brother Records Incorporated in a New York Superior Court. In 1998 a US judge temporarily barred Jardine from performing under the name “Beach Boys Family And Friends” after representations from Mike Love and Brother Records. Jardine lost the case in 2003.
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