SEX PISTOLS Members Suing JOHNNY ROTTEN Over Song Rights
July 16, 2021, 3 years ago
According to the Associated Press, two former members of the Sex Pistols are suing singer Johnny Rotten for the right to use the band’s songs in an upcoming television series about the anarchic punk rock icons.
Guitarist Steve Jones and drummer Paul Cook want the songs to appear in “Pistol,” a television series based on a memoir by Jones. Rotten, whose real name is John Lydon, has slammed the series as “disrespectful” and is refusing to grant permission for the songs to be included.
Edmund Cullen, a lawyer for Jones and Cook, told a judge at the High Court in London on Thursday that the former bandmates have a “brittle and fractious” relationship.
Cullen argued that under the terms of a 1998 band agreement, decisions regarding licensing requests could be determined on a “majority rules basis.” Lydon, however, contends that licenses to use the music can’t be granted without his consent.
Cullen said both the band’s original bassist, Glen Matlock, and the estate of Matlock’s replacement, Sid Vicious, supported the position of Cook and Jones. Vicious died in 1979 at age 21.
Read more at Associated Press.
