| Subject: Bay City Rollers sue Arista for royalties (not exactly a new story, but thought I'd post it) |
Author:
Cathy
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Date Posted: 12:48:57 01/24/08 Thu
Seventies Scottish pop band the Bay City Rollers, with hits such as Bye Bye Baby, Saturday Night and Shang-a-Lang, are suing their former record label Arista claiming millions in unpaid royalties.
Band members lead singer Les McKeown, guitarists Eric Faulkner and Stuart Wood, bassist Alan Longmuir and his brother, Derek, the drummer, as well asDuncan Faure, who replaced McKeown in 1978 accuse Arista Records of neglecting to hand over 25 years of royalty payments.
“How much money should I have?” McKeown said in an interview three years ago. “Quite a lot. Probably millions.”
The six members estimate they sold about 120 million records worldwide in their heyday and have reunited to file a claim in a Manhattan court.
Fans will recall the band’s trademarkSaturday Night song which had a refrain, more of a chant,spelling out S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y repeatedly. The songhitNo. 1 on the Billboard chart in 1976.
The group is demanding royalties from Arista generated from their albums, multimedia licences, merchandise and rights to films, commercials and other recordings.
“To this day, Arista Records is still successfully exploiting their recordings in the U.S. and around the world,” claimed Joshua Krumholz, one of the band’s lawyers.
The court claim says the band only received a payment of 133,000 ($302,800 Cdn) back in 1997. It also maintains the record label had claimed it does not know who to pay and made excuses to avoid payment.
Arista officials have previously said that in fighting among the band members had made it difficult to disburse the payments.
Arista Records, part of Sony BMG Music, declined to comment on the matter.
Only two members of the band now make a living from music. Alan Longmuir works as a plumber and his brother Derek is a nurse. Almost all have battled drug addiction and depression
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