Radio, Azoff Call Temporary Cease-Fire

Irving Azoff’s Global Music Rights has agreed to a temporary settlement with a group representing 10,000 radio stations. The legal cease-fire allows members of the Radio Music License Committee to continue playing compositions of the artists represented by Azoff’s group through Sept. 30, 2017.

In exchange, the RMLC has agreed to drop an injunction request against Global Music Rights, according to ampthemag.com.

The deal gives both sides some breathing room in the ongoing legal drama that’s morphed into dueling Federal lawsuits in California. Radio stations had been up against a Dec. 31 deadline to strike a deal or face potential copyright infringement lawsuits from GMR. The two sides are suing each other in separate federal lawsuits after negotiations for a new licensing agreement fell apart in November.

Irving Azoff

GMR claims it had made the same offer to the radio station group in December,  “but the RMLC refused it and, instead, chose to sue and seek an injunction.”

The RLMC informed its members of the temporary settlement in a letter (read it here), writing “as a result of further discussions between the RMLC and GMR, GMR will make available to radio stations an interim license. This interim license will provide stations that choose to accept it the ability to perform GMR compositions during the term of the interim license.”

The amount each station will pay varies and financial terms of the temporary settlement were not released. The RMLC told the stations it represents that they have until “January 31, 2017 to sign the interim license agreement and pay GMR according to its terms.”

Both sides had been in talks over a license for 2017, but the radio group complained that Azoff was demanding too much money and filed a lawsuit, accusing GMR of being monopolistic with its catalog, which includes compositions by some of the world’s biggest artists like  The Beatles, Beyonce, John Legend, The Eagles and Weird Al Yankovic.