Talking about, erm, people formerly belonging to collectives with 'crew' in the name going to court, Marquis Ross, formerly of 2 Live Crew, has filed a lawsuit against Ice-T and Jay-Z which claims he is entitled to royalties for lyrics and a beat used by Jay-Z in a track on 'The Black Album'.
Ross says he wrote lyrics and a beat which are similar to those used in '99 Problems', a song which Ross alleges is based on a song of the same name which appeared on Ice-T's 'Home Invasion' album back in 1993. The lawsuit says that Ross was asked by Ice-T to appear on that track, having performed parts of it prior to their collaboration. Ice-T copyrighted the original track in his own name, refusing to pay his collaborator any royalties until earlier this year when he made a partial payment of $10,000 to the 2 Live Crew rapper, after the release of the subsequent Jay-Z track. Ross is now requesting back royalties and punitive damages from both rappers.