Limp Bizkit, Fred Durst, and Flawless Records—the record label solely owned by Durst—are suing Universal Music Group (UMG) for over $200 million that they claim they’re owed in unpaid royalties, according to a lawsuit viewed by Pitchfork. Filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, the lawsuit states that, since Limp Bizkit’s recent resurgence in popularity, the band and label have not been paid any of the music streaming royalties that they’re owed for nearly half a billion streams.
Durst seeks to void all contracts with UMG on behalf of Limp Bizkit and Flawless Records. Together, all three are suing for breach of contract, fraudulent concealment, and copyright infringement, among other issues. Pitchfork has contacted representatives for Limp Bizkit and Universal Music Group for comment.
As outlined in the lawsuit, Limp Bizkit’s assets have seen a steady growth of 30-40% with each year since 2017—despite, as they note, the fact that the band hasn’t released any new music—and surged to approximately 68% in the past year alone. “Despite this tremendous ‘come back,’ the band had still not been paid a single cent by UMG in any royalties until taking action against UMG,” reads the lawsuit. “Not only did UMG never have any intention of paying Plaintiffs, it designed and implemented royalty software and systems that were deliberately designed to conceal artists’ (including Plaintiffs’) royalties and keep those profits for itself. On information and belief, Plaintiffs’ discovery of UMG’s design flaw in its royalty software is systemic and affects not only Plaintiffs but possibly hundreds of other artists who have unfairly had their royalties wrongfully withheld for years.”
After hiring new legal representation, in April 2024, Durst explained that Limp Bizkit hadn’t been receiving money for their royalties because UMG claimed it was withheld to recoup approximately $43 million that the company spent on the band over the years. Durst didn’t raise suspicion until the former owner of Flip Records—the label that signed Limp Bizkit, in 1996, before Interscope signed a new deal with them in 2000—informed him that Flip Records had received “millions of dollars” from the band’s assets in recent years through UMG.
“In reviewing the documents Plaintiffs had access to, they discovered that UMG had not provided a detailed accounting of its alleged recoupment costs, had claimed recoupment costs for an extraordinarily long time, and had failed to issue any royalty statements at all for certain periods, including those during which Limp Bizkit was selling millions of albums,” reads the lawsuit. Notably, it claims that UMG failed to issue royalty statements from 1997 to 2004—the height of Limp Bizkit’s fame in terms of record sales, radio play, and more.
UMG statements showed that Limp Bizkit’s 2005 album, Greatest Hitz, didn’t generate “any positive royalties payable to the band” due to unrecouped losses as recently as the end of 2022. Additionally, the lawsuit claims that UMG failed to provide royalty statements for Limp Bizkit’s fourth album, as well as their music videos utilizing the Master Recordings during “significant periods of time.”
Source : Pitchfork
