This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.
Legal
Popovich estate claims ownership of Bat Out Of Hell
By CMU Editorial | Published on Monday 3 October 2011
In an interesting if possibly optimistic US legal dispute, the estate of the late record label exec Stephen Popovich is trying to seize ownership of the sound recording rights in the iconic Meat Loaf album ‘Bat Out Of Hell’, currently owned by Sony Music.
Popovich, whose Cleveland International Records released ‘Bat Out Of Hell’ in 1977 in partnership with the exec’s former employer Epic Records, had various run ins with Sony over the years, it having owned Epic from the late 1980s onwards. He claimed that the major frequently misreported royalties accrued by the record so to underpay him his share, and he also sued when Sony failed to fulfil a contractual commitment to include the Cleveland International logo on all releases of the album. A 1998 lawsuit ended in an out of court settlement, while in 2002 litigation – in part based on allegations Sony had breached the 1998 agreement – Popovich won $5 million.
Popovich died back in June, but his estate has taken up the ongoing battle with Sony. In a new lawsuit the estate claims that Sony continues to violate the terms of its agreements with Cleveland International Records, accusing the major of a number of fraudulent acts used, the estate says, to underpay the indie label its due on ‘Bat Out Of Hell’ revenue. The lawsuit adds that the estate doesn’t know how much is owed because Sony, it claims, has refused permission to undertake an audit.
The lawsuit, as you’d expect, wants full accounts from Sony, any unpaid royalties and damages, but the legal claim goes further than that. The estate argues that Sony has now breached past agreements so often that the rights to the master recordings of the Meat Loaf album should revert to Cleveland International, and the estate is seeking a court injunction to confirm that fact, and to prevent Sony from distributing the record. That’s possibly the optimistic bit, though if this ever reaches court it could be an interesting case.
Sony is yet to respond.
