A litany of litigation...
The next time you're thinking of using either the music or likeness of someone famous without paying for it, think again...
The families of Abbott and Costello, Laurel and Hardy and many countless others throughout the years have sued sponsors for making a profit from the fruits of their loved ones labors without permission or payment for that use. Two of the bigger cases in recent history happened on this date...
In 1995 a settlement returned the rights to Jimi Hendrix's estate to his father. The ruling included all unmastered tapes, concert recordings, photographs and other personal possessions...
In 1987 you might say The Beatles and Yoko Ono were fit to be tied. On July 28th, the remaining members of the Fab Four and John Lennon's wife, sued Nike from using "Revolution" in it's sneaker ads. While no official record of the conclusion of this lawsuit is available you can be sure that it ended in a hefty out-of-court payment to the litigants and rightfully so...
More July 28 Memories...
1956) Elvis Presley reaches the top of the charts for the second time with "I Want You, I Need You, I Love You."
1957) Jerry Lee Lewis makes his TV debut on the "Steve Allen Show"...
1970) Mick Jagger makes his movie debut in "Ned Kelly"...
1973) Lee Majors and Farrah Fawcett tie the knot...
1973) Grand Funk Railroad releases "We're An American Band"...
1973) A crowd of 600,000 gathers at Watkins Glen, NY for the "Summer Jam" festival starring the Allman Brothers and Grateful Dead...
1978) At Old Timer's Day at Yankee Stadium it's announced that Billy Martin will return as Yankee Manager in 1979...
1979) The World Series of Rock is held at Cleveland Stadium with Journey, Ted Nugent and Thin Lizzy...
1987) Beatles sue Nike (feature story)...
1991) The Expos Dennis Martinez pitches a perfect game...
1994) Three years later to the date, Texas Ranger pitcher Kenny Rogers pitches the next perfect game...
1995) James Al Hendrix gets his son's estate (feature story)...
1999) Future Hall of Fame running back, Barry Sanders hangs up his cleats...
2000) Kathie Lee Gifford makes her final appearance as co-host of "Live with Regis and Kathie Lee."
2002) Lance Armstrong wins his 4th consecutive Tour de France...
Happy Birthday to...
1937) Bandleader Peter Duchin...
1943) Former Knick and U.S. Senator, Bill Bradley...
1945) Garfield cartoonist, Jim Davis...
1946) Jonathan ("Sunshine") Edwards...
1948) Georgia ("Mary Tyler Moore Show") Engel...
1948) Sally ("All in the Family") Struthers...
Commentary...
Apparently the recent investigations on payola have just scratched the surface of what could be a sweeping attempt to "clean up" the shenanigans used to get music played on the radio. Having been on both sides of the radio and records fences I'm an interested on-looker who can't help feeling an overwhelming amount of skepticism that anything substantial will be done to clean up this mess...
I can only hope that the quilty pay for their crimes and let's move on with it. Neither wrist-slapping or a witch-hunt is in order. Present the evidence, fine, suspend or fire the quilty and enact or ammend laws...
As with everything else that's overblown in the media, this is the exception rather than the rule. We all know that an overwhelming majority of radio and record people are honest, hard working people. For those that are not, "If you do the crime, you pay the time", end of story...
