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Ocean responds to Chipotle lawsuit with an FU cheque
By Chris Cooke | Published on Thursday 13 March 2014
We don’t know how Frank Ocean’s lawyers have so far responded to the previously reported legal action he is facing from US-based Mexican grill chain Chipotle, but the man himself doesn’t seem to be in an especially conciliatory mood.
Chipotle claims that it paid the singer a $212,500 advance for him to record a version of ‘Pure Imagination’, a song originally written for the soundtrack of the film ‘Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory’. But Ocean subsequently bailed on the project and has yet to repay the upfront monies he received.
For his part, Ocean seems to claim that Chipotle misled him regarding the nature of the project he was working on. He says he thought the track would be used on a video that solely aimed to promote responsible farming, but later learned that there would be more overt promotion of the restaurant chain too. His lawyers are possibly justifying him keeping the money by saying he’d done a chunk of the work before he realised all this.
But Chipotle, which disputes any misrepresentation of the project took place, is suing to get its money back. And as news of the lawsuit spread, Ocean posted to his Tumblr a photo of a cheque for the amount Chipotle claims it’s owed, but with the payee’s name redacted and, more importantly, the words “fuck off’ scribbled in one corner.
A spokesperson for Chipotle told Rolling Stone that the company is yet to receive the tumbled cheque, but if it did turn up and it cleared, despite the “fuck off” note in the corner, then the company gladly fuck off and withdraw the litigation (well, I’m paraphrasing a little, and there might still be the matter of legal fees).
