In June 2014, the two surviving members of the Beastie Boys — Adam “Ad-Rock” Horowitz and Mike “Mike D” Diamond — along with the wife of their deceased partner in crime — Adam “MCA” Yauch — won a lawsuit against Monster Energy Drink. The Beasties were suing the energy drink for using their songs without permission, seeking up to $2.5 million for copyright infringement and false endorsement. They were eventually awarded $1.7 million, a ruling Monster sought and failed to have over-turned.
Well, Monster must now pay an additional $668,000 to cover the Beastie Boys’ legal fees. The band had asked for $2.4 million to cover legal fees, but the ruling covers a good portion of what they actually paid. U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer ruled that, upon reviewing the band’s legal expenses, it was apparent that the “Beastie Boys opted to pay for, and received, the ‘Cadillac Escalade,’ not the ‘Honda Civic’ of legal representation.”
“Presiding over trial and hearing the surviving Beastie Boys’ testimony, it was apparent to the court that this case had great personal significance to them,” he said. “Monster’s commercial exploitation of the band’s music and songs, and what the Beastie Boys perceived as Monster’s crass misappropriation of the name of the recently deceased Yauch in its video promoting its energy drinks, appeared to have deeply offended plaintiffs.”
When the verdict was reached last summer, Monster copped to using the songs without permission, but placed blame on an employee who had only used the songs because the employee thought Monster had been given permission.
The lawsuit dates back to 2012, when the band and Yauch’s widow took issue with a Monster promotional video that included a set by DJ Z-Trip at a concert sponsored by Monster, the Ruckus in the Rockies festival in Canada. The video included parts of four Beastie Boys’ songs: “Sabotage,” “So What’cha Want,” “Make Some Noise,” and “Lookin’ Down the Barrel of a Gun.” Monster also released a 23-minute compilation of the band’s songs available for MP3 download. The Beastie Boys had never licensed any of their music for product advertisements during their career, and said that they would have turned Monster down had they asked.
(Via New York Times)
