Fred Durst sues Universal Music over alleged unpaid royalties amounting to more than $200 million
· louderBy Fraser Lewry
( Metal Hammer )
published 8 October 2024
The Limp Bizkit frontman filed the suit at federal court in Los Angeles
Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst has sued the band's former label Universal Music for $200 million over alleged unpaid royalties. Durst's legal team filed the papers in federal court in Los Angeles today, claiming that a deliberate flaw in Universal's royalty system meant the band – and other artists – were owed millions of dollars in unpaid royalties.
According to the legal papers, Universal has "wrongfully defrauded [the] Plaintiffs out of millions of dollars", and owes them "in excess" of $200 million.
The alleged shortfall was uncovered when Durst asked Universal why he'd never received any royalties from the company, and was told that the band had failed to recoup the $43 million in advances received from the label since signing with the Universal-distributed Interscope label in 1997. The failure to recoup is disputed by the band, as is the figure of $43 million.
"According to UMG’s royalty statements, Plaintiffs’ accounts had been payable starting in 2019, and then fraudulently reclassified as 'unrecouped' to prevent payment," reads the lawsuit. "Had Plaintiffs not discovered this fraud, Plaintiffs have every reason to believe that UMG would have found a way to fraudulently turn its positive accounts back into negative “unrecouped” accounts, as it had done in the past, to continue to avoid its payment obligations in perpetuity."
The suit continues, "Defendants has knowingly performed acts, including but not limited to, failing to properly compute Plaintiffs’ royalties, failing to provide accurate royalty or profit statements, failing to notify Plaintiffs of positive royalty or profit balances, improperly (and fraudulently) calculating royalties, profits, and recoupments, failing to timely pay royalties and profits, intentionally misrepresenting royalties and profits owed to Plaintiffs, and systematically designing and implementing a system to prevent Plaintiffs from obtaining their royalties and profits."
The lawsuit seeks full payment of royalties owed, in excess of $20 million in damages, and the return of Limp Bizkit's copyrights.
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Online Editor at Louder/Classic Rock magazine since 2014. 38 years in music industry, online for 25. Also bylines for: Metal Hammer, Prog Magazine, The Word Magazine, The Guardian, The New Statesman, Saga, Music365. Former Head of Music at Xfm Radio, A&R at Fiction Records, early blogger, ex-roadie, published author. Once appeared in a Cure video dressed as a cowboy, and thinks any situation can be improved by the introduction of cats. Favourite Serbian trumpeter: Dejan Petrović.
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