Legal News
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A federal judge ruled Wednesday (May 29) that a sprawling copyright lawsuit can move forward with accusations that nearly 2,000 reggaeton songs — including hits by Bad Bunny, Karol G and dozens of others — all infringed a single 1989 song that allegedly spawned the so-called “dem bow” rhythm.
The huge infringement case, filed by Cleveland “Clevie” Browne and the heirs of Wycliffe “Steely” Johnson, claims that their 1989 song, “Fish Market,” was the source of dem bow — the boom-ch-boom-chick, boom-ch-boom-chick percussion featured in nearly every reggaeton song.
Demanding that the case be dismissed, Bad Bunny’s lawyers argued last year that Steely & Clevie’s massive case “seeks to monopolize practically the entire reggaetón musical genre for themselves” by claiming copyright control over “unprotectable” musical elements.
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But in the lawsuit’s first key decision, Judge André Birotte Jr. denied that motion on Wednesday, ruling that it was too early in the case to make those kinds of complex rulings and that Steely & Clevie had made a strong enough argument to move forward: “It is premature at this stage to find that the musical elements alleged are insufficiently original or indeed unprotectable.”
Notably, the judge also hinted that he might not be particularly receptive to such arguments when it’s time to rule on them. At one point, he warned that he “rejects” the idea that the massive success of a particular song could be used as a “double-edged sword” that would also void its copyrights.
“The court recognizes the practice of musical borrowing, and in doing so, cannot merely conclude that because the reggaeton genre (or artists) have purportedly borrowed significantly from attributes of plaintiffs’ work that those attributes are now in effect commonplace elements,” Judge Birotte wrote.
First filed in 2021 against just a handful of defendants, Steely & Clevie’s lawsuit has steadily grown to cover more and more artists and songs. In the latest iteration, the duo’s lawyers name more than 150 artists, also including Pitbull, Drake, Daddy Yankee, Luis Fonsi and Justin Bieber, plus units of all three major music companies.
Steely & Clevie’s lawyers claim that over 1,800 reggaetón songs featuring iterations of the dem bow rhythm were, at root, illegally copied from “Fish Market” — and that their clients deserve monetary compensation for them. Potentially damages are difficult to calculate, but could easily reach into the billions if the case is successful.
In Wednesday’s decision, Judge Birotte also rejected other arguments from the defendants beyond the core question of whether dem bow could be protected by copyright law.
For instance, in a June filing, attorneys for Daddy Yankee and the major labels argued that the case was so massive that it had become procedurally unfair. They called it a “shotgun pleading,” filled with so many vague accusations that it was “impossible for defendants to determine what each is alleged to have done.”
But in Wednesday’s decision, Judge Birotte said he was “unconvinced” by that argument — and that Steely & Clevie’s 228-page complaint had sufficiently laid out the case to satisfy procedural requirements.
Following Wednesday’s ruling, the case will proceed toward discovery, where both sides will exchange evidence, take depositions and seek expert testimony on complex questions relating to musicology. If the judge does not decide the case after discovery, the two sides will head to trial.
Neither side in the case immediately returned requests for comment.
StubHub must pay more than $16 million in legal damages after a jury decided that the ticketing giant intentionally torpedoed a smaller company’s lucrative concierge partnership with American Express.
Following a month-long trial, a Los Angeles jury on Friday (May 24) sided with Spotlight Ticket Management — a tech startup that had sued over allegations that StubHub failed to pay Spotlight millions in commissions and then used false statements to “poison” the company’s relationship with Amex.
Leading up to the trial, StubHub had argued it paid Spotlight everything that was owed and that the smaller firm had killed its Amex deal itself by being an “unreasonable partner” to the financial giant: “The true cause of Spotlight’s demise was Spotlight itself.”
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But in Friday’s verdict, the jurors found for Spotlight on both issues. They ordered StubHub to pay $3 million over the commissions; $5.3 million over money lost from the terminated Amex partnership; and another $8.1 million that they said Spotlight would have earned from Amex in the future.
StubHub did not immediately return a request for comment. Amex was not named as a defendant in the case or accused of any wrongdoing. In a statement, Spotlight called the verdict “a victory for Spotlight, for affiliate partners more broadly, and for ticket purchasers across the country.”
Launched in 2007, Spotlight offers ticketing management software to help companies provide event access to their employees or customers. One of its major clients was Amex, which used Spotlight as part of its concierge system to buy concert and sports tickets for premium cardholders.
In its lawsuit, Spotlight claimed that it had successfully partnered with StubHub for years, sending as much as $85 million in ticket sales to the company’s platform and receiving a 7% commission on those sales.
But starting in 2016, Spotlight claimed that StubHub began underpaying those commissions. And when the smaller company raised the dispute, it claimed that StubHub retaliated by tanking its relationship with Amex with false and disparaging claims.
“StubHub gave Amex an ‘ultimatum’ that it could not work with Spotlight for these reasons and Amex would lose access to StubHub’s entire ticket inventory, crushing the availability of secondary market tickets to the Amex Concierge program overnight, unless Amex got rid of Spotlight,” the company’s attorneys wrote in a pre-trial briefing.
StubHub sharply disagreed. In its own filings, the company argued that it had paid Spotlight all the commissions that it was actually owed under its affiliate program. And it said that the smaller company had “destroyed its own relationship with Amex” through “erratic behavior.”
“Spotlight has taken a modest dispute about payment of affiliate commissions and morphed it into a conspiratorial web to support its claim for hundreds of millions of dollars,” StubHub’s attorneys wrote. “Amex witnesses have testified that they decided not to renew based on Spotlight’s unreasonable demands and that StubHub had nothing to do with Amex’s decision.”
But following a three-week trial, jurors believed Spotlight’s version of events, finding StubHub liable for breach of contract over the unpaid commissions as well as intentional interference with contract and intentional interference with prospective economic relations over the Amex partnership.
StubHub can appeal the verdict, first by asking the judge to order a new trial and then by taking the case to a California appeals court.
Cher has won her lawsuit against Sonny Bono’s widow over royalties to “I Got You Babe” and other hits after a federal judge ruled that Mary Bono must continue paying the superstar her cut under the couple’s decades-old divorce settlement.
More than 20 years after Sonny’s death, Mary argued that she no longer needed to pay royalties to Cher thanks to copyright law’s so-called termination right — a provision of federal law that allows songwriters and their heirs to win back control of their intellectual property rights decades after they gave them away.
But in a decision issued Wednesday (May 29), Judge John A. Kronstadt ruled that the federal termination rules do not trump Sonny and Cher’s 1978 divorce settlement, which gave the singer a permanent 50% cut of the publishing revenue from songs written before the couple split up.
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The ruling means that Cher will continue to receive publishing royalties for her catalog of songs created with Sonny, including “The Beat Goes On” and “Baby Don’t Go.” According to Wednesday’s ruling, more than $400,000 in royalties owed to Cher have piled up since the dispute began.
Neither side’s attorneys immediately returned requests for comment.
Sonny and Cher started performing together in 1964 and married in 1967, rising to fame with major hits like “I Got You Babe,” “The Beat Goes On” and “Baby Don’t Go.” But the pair split up in 1974, finalizing their divorce with a settlement in 1978. Under that deal, Sonny retained ownership of their music rights, but Cher was granted a half-share of all publishing royalties in perpetuity.
That agreement stayed in effect for years, including after Bono died in a 1998 skiing accident. But in 2016, Mary and other heirs invoked the termination right, seeking to take back control of Sonny’s copyrights from his publishers. And in 2021, they informed Cher that they would soon stop paying royalties under the earlier agreement.
Cher quickly sued, seeking a ruling that she was still owed her 50% cut regardless of who owns the copyrights since a federal copyright provision had no bearing on a state-law asset settlement. Mary fired back a few months later, claiming that termination rights could not be waived by contract and that Cher’s arguments would “subvert” the purpose of the law.
In Wednesday’s ruling, Judge Kronstadt sided with Cher’s arguments. He ruled that the divorce settlement with Sonny gave Cher a “contractual right to receive financial compensation,” rather than the kind of control over his copyrights that could be voided using the termination right: “A right to receive royalties is distinct from a grant of copyright,” the judge wrote.
Ryan Castro won a multimillion-dollar lawsuit in an arbitration process against King Records, owned by fellow Colombian artist Kevin Roldán, for breach of contract. According to a resolution by a Colombian judge, the arbitration tribunal ruled that King Records must pay Castro an amount exceeding $2 million. In addition to this, the ruling grants the […]
This is The Legal Beat, a weekly newsletter about music law from Billboard Pro, offering you a one-stop cheat sheet of big new cases, important rulings and all the fun stuff in between.
This week: The federal government files an antitrust lawsuit against Live Nation and Ticketmaster aimed at breaking up the concert giant; Beyoncé faces a copyright lawsuit over a sample featured in “Break My Soul”; Elvis Presley’s heirs win a bizarre battle over Graceland; and much more.
THE BIG STORY: “It Is Time To Break It Up”
Fourteen years after federal regulators allowed Live Nation and Ticketmaster to merge into a concert behemoth, the U.S. Department of Justice and dozens of states filed a long-awaited antitrust lawsuit last week that aims to effectively reverse that decision.“Live Nation has illegally monopolized markets across the live concert industry in the United States for far too long,” said Attorney General Merrick Garland at a press conference announcing the case. “It is time to break it up.”Ever since the merger was approved in 2010, Live Nation has faced criticism over its huge market share. But scrutiny increased dramatically following the disastrous 2022 rollout of Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, which saw widespread service delays and website crashes. While the DOJ had already launched its probe prior to the Swift incident, the debacle sparked widespread public anger that led to Congressional hearings, private antitrust lawsuits, and repeated calls to break up the company.In a lawsuit aimed at doing just that, the DOJ focused on what it called Live Nation’s “flywheel model” — an alleged cycle of reaping revenue from ticketbuyers, using it to sign artists into promotion deals, and then leveraging that repertoire to lock venues into exclusive ticketing contracts. To bolster that model, the feds say Live Nation engaged in a wide range of anticompetitive conduct, including acquiring rivals and retaliating against venues that didn’t use Ticketmaster. In particular, the DOJ focused on emails between Live Nation chief executive Michael Rapino and venue management firm Oak View Group, a “potential competitor-turned-partner” that allegedly helped Live Nation stifle competition.For all the details, go read our full coverage on the Live Nation lawsuit — including our news story on the filing of the case (featuring the actual complaint filed by the DOJ) as well as a deep dive from Dave Brooks into those emails from Rapino. And stay tuned for more coverage from Billboard as the big case moves forward…
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Other top stories this week…
BEYONCÉ COPYRIGHT CASE – The superstar was hit with an infringement lawsuit over her chart-topping 2024 hit “Break My Soul,” filed by a little-known group that claims one of the song’s prominent samples — a clip taken from the New Orleans rapper Big Freedia — had itself illegally lifted lyrics from their earlier song.GRACELAND SNAFU ENDS – A bizarre legal battle over “fraudulent” efforts to sell Elvis Presley’s Graceland mansion came to close after a Tennessee judge granted his granddaughter Riley Keough a court order blocking the looming foreclosure before the mysterious loan company that orchestrated the event reportedly withdrew its filings. But the story isn’t over, as Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti launched an investigation into potential “misconduct” by the shadowy creditors behind the incident: “My office has fought fraud against homeowners for decades and there is no home in Tennessee more beloved than Graceland.”DIDDY SUED FACES 7TH ACCUSER – Sean “Diddy” Combs is facing yet another sexual abuse lawsuit, this time filed by a woman named April Lampros who claims that he drugged and sexually assaulted her 30 years ago while she was a college student in New York City. Lampros is the seventh alleged victim to file a lawsuit accusing Combs of sexual abuse over the past six months, including one filed just days prior. He’s also facing an apparent federal criminal investigation.EARTH, WIND & DAMAGES – A tribute act that called itself “Earth, Wind & Fire Legacy Reunion” will pay the legendary R&B group $750,000 in damages for using its trademarked name in ways that a federal judge called “deceptive and misleading,” according to court documents filed last week. ASTROWORLD LITIGATION UPDATE – Attorneys for Travis Scott, Live Nation and others reached a settlement to resolve the last remaining wrongful death lawsuit stemming from the deadly crowd crush at the 2021 Astroworld music festival, which left 10 fans dead. But thousands of claims from injured fans remain pending, with a potential first trial set for October.APPLE APPEALS HUGE EU FINE – Apple launched a legal challenge in European Union court against the 1.8 billion euro ($1.95 billion) fine assessed by the European Commission earlier this year over allegations that the tech giant broke competition laws by unfairly favoring its own music streaming service over rivals like Spotify.KELLY CLARKSON SETTLES WITH EX – The singer reached a settlement to end her sprawling legal battle with ex-husband Brandon Blackstock over management commissions. The divorce itself was finalized in 2022, but the pair had continued to battle in court over tricky business entanglements with Blackstock’s father’s firm Starstruck Entertainment, which managed her career for years.
Sean “Diddy” Combs is facing yet another sexual abuse lawsuit, this time filed by a woman who claims that he drugged and sexually assaulted her 30 years ago while she was a college student in New York City.
In a complaint filed Thursday in Manhattan court, April Lampros alleges that the rapper subjected her to “an aggressive, coercive, and abusive relationship based on sex,” including four instances of sexual assault.
In one such allegation, she says Combs forced her to take ecstasy and have sex with his former girlfriend Kim Porter. Though she “vocally opposed” the idea, she said she feared that Combs “blacklist her in the industry.”
“Ms. Lampros knew that she had to comply because she had witnessed what happens when someone defies Mr. Combs,” her lawyers write. “She had also been threatened and victimized by Mr. Combs and did not want to cause a problem because she feared him.”
Thursday’s lawsuit also names Sony Music Entertainment as a defendant, claiming the company “enabled” Combs’ conduct. She claims that she worked for Sony’s Arista Records when at least one of the attacks occurred, and that Sony “knew or should have known that Combs was not fit to be in a position of authority.”
Representatives for both Combs and Sony did not immediately return requests for comment.
Lampros is the seventh alleged victim to file a lawsuit accusing Combs of sexual abuse over the past six months, including one filed just days ago by a model named Crystal McKinney who claims the hip-hop mogul forced her to perform oral sex on him following a Men’s Fashion Week event in 2003. The rapper is also reportedly facing a federal criminal investigation over abuse accusations.
In previous statements, Combs has strongly denied any wrongdoing. But after a video surfaced last week showing Combs attacking one of those accusers – then-girlfriend Cassie Ventura – he said he took “full responsibility” for that incident and was “truly sorry.”
In her complaint, Lampros claims that she met Combs in 1994 while she was a college student at New York City’s Fashion Institute of Technology. After she told him about her “dreams of working in the fashion industry,” Lampros says Combs promised to mentor her and help her find work in the industry.
But she says the relationship quickly turned sexual, including “four terrifying sexual encounters” and threats of physical violence. One such incident occurred after a night out in 1995, when she claims that she began to feel unwell after taking just “a few sips of one drink.”
“Ms. Lampros pleaded with Mr. Combs to stop, and he ignored her,” her attorneys write. “Ms. Lampros could not process why this was occurring and felt a loss of control. Ms. Lampros was being raped by Mr. Combs, and she soon passed out.”
Thoughout the relationship, Lampros claims that Combs exercised power over her due to his fame and influence: “She felt that if she disobeyed him, he would take away her dreams of pursuing a career in his world.”
Lampros also claims that Combs surreptitiously filmed one of their sexual encounters and then shared the video with others. She says she learned of the tape in 2023, when an unnamed man told her boyfriend that “he should reconsider dating her because he personally saw a video of her and Sean Combs having sex.”
The lawsuit alleges that all of the defendants violated New York City’s Victims of Gender-Motivated Violence Protection Law. The case also includes counts of civil battery, sexual assault and negligent infliction of emotional distress against Combs.
Read the entire complaint here:
The one remaining wrongful death lawsuit filed after 10 people were killed during a deadly crowd crush at the 2021 Astroworld music festival has been settled, an attorney said Thursday.
Jury selection in the lawsuit filed by the family of 9-year-old Ezra Blount, the youngest person killed during the concert by rapper Travis Scott, had been set to begin Sept. 10.
But S. Scott West, an attorney for Blount’s family, said a settlement was reached this week.
Blount’s family had sued Scott, Live Nation — the festival’s promoter and the world’s largest live entertainment company — and other companies and individuals connected to the event, including Apple Inc., which livestreamed the concert.
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“The family will continue its journey to heal, but never forget the joy that Ezra brought to everyone around him,” West said in an email.
Treston Blount, Ezra’s father, had said that during the Nov. 5, 2021, concert, his son was sitting on his shoulders when they were crushed by the crowd. Treston Blount lost consciousness and when he came to, Ezra was missing. A frantic search ensued until Ezra was eventually found at a Houston hospital, severely injured. The boy, who was from Dallas, died several days later.
The lawsuit filed by Blount’s family was one of 10 wrongful death civil suits filed after the deadly concert.
Earlier this month, lawyers had announced that the other nine wrongful death lawsuits had been settled in connection with the concert.
Terms of the settlements in all 10 lawsuits were confidential.
The settlement of the lawsuit filed by Blount’s family was first reported by the Houston Chronicle.
Attorneys for Live Nation, Scott and others have declined to comment in the case because of a gag order that limits what they can say outside court.
About 2,400 injury cases filed after the deadly concert remain pending. More than 4,000 plaintiffs filed hundreds of lawsuits after the Astroworld crowd crush.
During the crowd crush, attendees were packed so tightly that many could not breathe or move their arms. Those killed ranged in age from 9 to 27. They died from compression asphyxia, which an expert likened to being crushed by a car.
Earlier this month, state District Judge Kristen Hawkins, who is presiding over the litigation, had scheduled the first trial related to the injury cases for Oct. 15. That trial was set to focus on seven injury cases. It was not clear on Thursday if that trial date would remain or be moved up with the settlement in the Blount lawsuit.
So far, no lawsuit has gone before a jury. One wrongful death lawsuit — filed by the family of 23-year-old Houston resident Madison Dubiski — was days away from going to trial earlier this month before it was delayed and then settled.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs in the lawsuits have alleged in court filings that the deaths and hundreds of injuries at the concert were caused by negligent planning and a lack of concern over capacity and safety at the event.
Scott, Live Nation and the others who’ve been sued have denied these claims, saying safety was their No. 1 concern. They said what happened could not have been foreseen.
After a police investigation, a grand jury last year declined to indict Scott, along with five others connected to the festival.
The Department of Justice dropped a wide-ranging antitrust complaint against Live Nation on Thursday (May 23), highlighting more than a dozen examples of the company’s “anticompetitive and exclusionary” behavior in accusing it of operating live music’s largest monopoly.
The evidence looks particularly bad for Live Nation chief executive Michael Rapino, whose own emails are being used against him to document alleged threats made against competitors while the company was operating under a federal consent decree tied to its 2010 merger with Live Nation.
Under the arrangement, regulators with the government had the right to obtain company documents, including communications, without a subpoena. The most damaging evidence is an email exchange involving Oak View Group’s Tim Leiweke and mega music manager Irving Azoff, who co-founded the arena development and management company together.
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Leiweke was the CEO of AEG, Live Nation’s main rival in the concert business, until 2012, when he was fired by company owner Phil Anschutz. After a brief stint running the Toronto Maple Leafs and its sports and entertainment interests in Canada, he returned to the United States and eventually founded Oak View Group (OVG) in 2015.
The government claims Rapino tried to leverage his company’s partnership with OVG to pressure private equity firm Silver Lake to kill off a rival ticketing company that Rapino allegedly believed represented a major threat to Ticketmaster.
If true, the story could be a major problem for Rapino, underscoring the government narrative that despite Live Nation’s massive market share, the CEO operates the company like a paranoid pugilist, willing to cross ethical and legal boundaries to eliminate tiny threats.
Silver Lake has been OVG’s strategic investment partner since the company’s founding, investing $100 million to launch it. Today, it has more than $2.5 billion tied up in OVG development projects. Silver Lake also owns TEG, an Australian concert promotion company that operates Ticketek, a large Australian ticket provider with more than 130 clients.
According to the 120-page complaint filed Thursday in federal court, “In 2021, Live Nation’s CEO complained to Oak View Group’s co-founder that TEG was ‘[f]ull on competitors.’ Oak View Group, in turn, conveyed to Silver Lake that Live Nation was ‘not happy.’” The complaint adds that Rapino then escalated his complaints to Silver Lake directly, stating: “I am all in on [Oak View Group] where the big play lies with venues – why insult me with this investment in ticketing/promotions etc.’”
According to the lawsuit, “Rapino threatened to pull its support from Oak View Group and instead back an Oak View Group competitor unless TEG stopped competing with Live Nation in the United States,” the complaint alleges.
“I can assure you the OVG investment is a much bigger win then T[E]G,” Rapino wrote in an email to an unnamed Silver Lake executive that’s included in the lawsuit. “It’s been a huge win for both sides– we have over 20 global arenas in development that neither could do without the other … do you really want LN backing [AEG’s venue development and management company]…? Seems like a dumb trade off??”
To aid in the pressure campaign, Azoff “reportedly refused to allow TEG to promote any of his large roster of artist clients,” the complaint alleges. It further states that Azoff told Rapino “that he was going to demand that Silver Lake sell TEG. [To which] Live Nation’s CEO replied ‘Love ya.’”
“Silver Lake now seems ‘intent on dumping teg’ and has asked, through the founder of Oak View Group, whether Live Nation would be interested in purchasing TEG,” the complaint reads in describing the back-and-forth.
Live Nation did not purchase TEG, but in early 2023, a deal was brokered for Silver Lake to sell the company to investment companies Blackstone and KKR. That deal collapsed in October over disagreements over the valuation of the company, which is now being readied for an IPO in Australia.
Live Nation issued a statement on this allegation, stating that the “claim reveals not only a disregard for the facts, but also deep hypocrisy.”
“The current DOJ and FTC have been vocal critics of private equity companies making multiple investments in the same industry because of competitive ‘entanglements,’” the statement continues. “So was Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino when, after it had already made an investment in OVG, Silver Lake Partners decided to invest in the Australian live entertainment company, TEG. Rapino’s complaint was fundamentally the same as the DOJ/FTC concern with private equity rollups: it created a conflict between OVG, which had become a close partner to Live Nation, and TEG. So, in December 2021 when a TEG employee wrote to say that it did not intend to compete with Live Nation in the U.S., Rapino replied to Silver Lake’s management that he did not care about TEG, but still had a problem with Silver Lake’s decision to make multiple conflicting investments in the industry.”
The statement also claims that “there is no truth that this brief exchange had anything to do with Silver Lake’s decision to sell its stake in TEG.”
In addition to the allegations around TEG, the government’s complaint further alleges that OVG, when it was first founded in 2015, was “particularly well-suited to be a real competitor to Live Nation in the United States concert promotion business” but changed its model to avoid competing with Live Nation.
The evidence from the time, however, shows that OVG and Live Nation had long billed themselves as partners. A November 2015 press release announcing OVG’s launch includes a quote from Rapino endorsing Leiweke’s business model, stating, “Both Tim and Irving are friends of Live Nation as well as personal friends. The concept of creating an economic model for both arena’s and touring artists that creates new revenue streams and develops an ‘anchor’ type of platform for music is one we share.”
The DOJ claims that Live Nation initially identified OVG as one of its “Biggest Competitor Threats” but that over time, the two firms morphed “from competitors into partners who found it easier and mutually beneficial to work together rather than compete.”
According to the government, OVG in fact operates as “a self-described ‘pimp’ and ‘hammer’ for Live Nation, with Leiweke once telling Rapino ‘[j]ust like I tell our folks we 100% always protect you and LN on your lanes.’”
In 2016, “after learning that Oak View Group offered to promote an artist Live Nation had previously promoted, Live Nation’s CEO immediately emailed Oak View Group, warning that such competition would only lead to artists demanding more compensation,” reads the complaint. It further includes an email in which Rapino wrote of the artist: “Whats up? We have done his [touring] and vegas[.] Let’s make sure we don’t let [the artist agency] now start playing us off.”
As outlined in the complaint, Leiweke immediately responded, “Our guys got a bit ahead. All know we don’t promote and we only do tours with Live Nation.”
Azoff later chimed in, writing “Growing pains,” subsequently noting that OVG executives “should never discuss comp [for artists],” and that OVG’s talent buyers would work for Live Nation.
The government argues that this discussion is an example of Leiweke and Azoff colluding with Rapino to limit the competitive bids sent to an artist in order to keep artists fees low. In another example cited in the complaint from 2022, Rapino admonished Leweike for making a direct offer to an artist to play an OVG venue instead of asking Live Nation to promote the show for OVG.
“Who would be so stupid to do this and play into [the artist agent’s] arms”? Rapino asked Leiweke in the email. Leiweke responded, “We have never promoted without you. Won’t,” before later writing, “[m]ore than happy to do these deals thru LN as I have always been aligned,” and that “I never want to be competitors.”
The complaint also alleges that Live Nation “exploits its long-term relationship with Oak View Group to flip venues to Ticketmaster, further cementing Ticketmaster’s power.”
According to the DOJ, in 2022, Live Nation and OVG signed an unspecified agreement that resulted in OVG recognizing “it has a significant financial interest in maintaining existing Ticketmaster contracts at its venues and converting other venues to Ticketmaster.”
At some point, according to the lawsuit, Leiweke told Rapino that the deal “allows us to tie up all owned and operated facilities to 10 year deals, develop a standard A and B market deal for all future projects and to convert all OVG 360 deals to TM now or as they expire for 10 years… Appreciate the consideration and partnership and all of us will work diligently on this so we are always aligned with TM.”
Live Nation responded to this claim in a statement: “The theory is that the contract gave Ticketmaster an unfair advantage in securing the business of independent venues that were managed by OVG because it creates financial incentives for OVG to ‘advocate for’ Ticketmaster. But there is nothing remotely anticompetitive about that. Commercial arrangements that involve incentive or marketing payments are common throughout this industry (and many others).” The statement adds, “Ticketmaster competed and won the contract on the merits because OVG determined it was the best ticketing system available.”
Kelly Clarkson has settled a lawsuit against her ex-husband Brandon Blackstock over commissions he was paid during his time as her manager, according to a new report in Rolling Stone.
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Clarkson requested a dismissal of the case on Tuesday (May 21), while Blackstock and his father’s management firm, Starstruck Entertainment, requested to dismiss the case on Wednesday (May 22), according to court documents reviewed by Billboard — though the documents do not mention a settlement.
Billboard has reached out to Clarkson and Blackstock’s reps for more information but did not receive a response at the time of publication.
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The reported settlement comes two months after Clarkson filed a case in Los Angeles courton March 14 seeking a ruling that Starstruck Entertainment had been violating state labor rules stemming from the start of their relationship. The lawsuit sought the return of “any and all commissions, fees, profits, advances, producing fees or other monies” she paid to Starstruck Entertainment dating all the way back to 2007.
Clarkson filed for divorce from Blackstock in June 2020 after seven years of marriage. The case was finalized in 2022, and the singer agreed to pay her ex-husband monthly child support of $45,601 for their two children — nine-year-old daughter River Rose and eight-year-old son Remy Alexander — plus a one-time payment of $1.3 million.
Shortly after Clarkson filed for divorce, Starstruck sued her for alleged unpaid fees, claiming the company had “invested a great deal of time, money, energy, and dedication” into her and had “developed Clarkson into a mega superstar.”
In response, Clarkson filed a complaint with California’s Labor Commissioner, claiming that Blackstock and Starstruck had violated California’s Talent Agencies Act by serving as her managers as well as unlicensed talent agents who booked her business deals. In November, a Labor Commissioner ruled in Clarkson’s favor and Blackstock was ordered to repay Clarkson more than $2.6 million in commissions she paid him for handling a number of deals, including her role as a coach on The Voice. A month later, Blackstock and Starstruck challenged the ruling in court, asking for a Los Angeles judge to rule rather than the Labor Commissioner.
The U.S. Department of Justice and a group of 30 states on Thursday filed a long-awaited antitrust lawsuit against Live Nation, accusing the concert giant of market dominance and demanding that it and Ticketmaster be broken up. “It is time to break it up,” said Attorney General Merrick Garland at an announcement of the suit on Thursday.
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The lawsuit, filed in Manhattan federal court, claims that Live Nation has abused its huge market power to stifle competition, including through the use of exclusive ticketing contracts that lock venues into using Ticketmaster for all events. As part of its case against Live Nation, Garland said the government will present evidence taken from emails between Live Nation chief executive Michael Rapino and Oak View Group chief Tim Leiweke, as well as communications between Rapino and the head of powerful equity firm Silver Lake capital.
“We allege that Live Nation has repeatedly wielded its powers to keep its rivals from expanding in the U.S. concert promotions market through threats and retaliation,” Garland said. In his remarks, he alleged that in 2021, Live Nation threatened to retaliate against Silver Lake unless it divested from TEG, one of its portfolio companies. According to Garland, Live Nation chief Michael Rapino told Silver Lake that he “failed to understand why [the equity firm] continued to invest in a business that competes with Live Nation.”
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Garland added: “The threats ultimately succeeded and Silver Lake has tried to sell TEG altogether. We allege that Live Nation does not maintain its dominance in the live industry by staying ahead of its competition on the merits. It does so by unlawfully eliminating its competition. We allege that Live Nation controls the live entertainment industry in the United States because it is breaking the law.”
To address the alleged violations, the DOJ argues that Live Nation must divest ownership of Ticketmaster – effectively undoing a controversial 2010 merger that was approved by federal regulators despite fears that it would give the company too much power over live music.
“Today’s complaint alleges that Live Nation-Ticketmaster have engaged in anticompetitive conduct to cement their dominance of the live concert market and act as the gatekeeper for an entire industry,” said Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco during today’s press conference. “Today’s action is a step forward in making this era of live music more accessible for the fans, the artists, and the industry that supports them.”
Live Nation has long faced criticism over its market share, but scrutiny of the company increased dramatically following the disastrous November 2022 rollout of tickets for Taylor Swift’s 2023 Eras Tour, which saw widespread service delays and website crashes.
The DOJ had already launched an investigation into the company’s practices earlier in 2022, prior to the Swift incident. But the botched presale sparked Congressional hearings, civil antitrust lawsuits, and calls to break up the company. Lawmakers like Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), the chair of the Senate subcommittee for antitrust issues, warned that Live Nation’s power “insulates it from the competitive pressures that typically push companies to innovate and improve their services.”
According to the 120-page complaint filed by the government, Live Nation-Ticketmaster has “unlawfully maintained monopolies in several concert promotions and primary ticketing markets and engaged in other exclusionary conduct affecting live concert venues, including arenas and amphitheaters.”
The complaint specifically takes aim at Live Nation’s “flywheel model,” which it describes as a “self-reinforcing business model that captures fees and revenue from concert fans and sponsorship, uses that revenue to lock up artists to exclusive promotion deals, and then uses its powerful cache of live content to sign venues into long term exclusive ticketing deals, thereby starting the cycle all over again.”
Live Nation has rejected such accusations. In a blog post last month, the company’s top antitrust lawyer argued that claims about “monopolies” were designed to “rile up fans against Live Nation and Ticketmaster.” As recently as Tuesday, company president Joe Berchtold said that the company’s practices were “fully defensible” and that a settlement with the DOJ was still possible.
“The DOJ’s lawsuit won’t solve the issues fans care about relating to ticket prices, service fees, and access to in-demand shows,” a statement from Live Nation reads. “Calling Ticketmaster a monopoly may be a PR win for the DOJ in the short term, but it will lose in court because it ignores the basic economics of live entertainment, such as the fact that the bulk of service fees go to venues, and that competition has steadily eroded Ticketmaster’s market share and profit margin. Our growth comes from helping artists tour globally, creating lasting memories for millions of fans, and supporting local economies across the country by sustaining quality jobs. We will defend against these baseless allegations, use this opportunity to shed light on the industry, and continue to push for reforms that truly protect consumers and artists.”
When Live Nation and Ticketmaster merged in 2010, the DOJ approved the deal but imposed a so-called consent decree designed to prevent the company from abusing its position. Those restrictions were set to expire in 2020, but they were extended by five years after the DOJ accused Live Nation of repeatedly violating the decree.