Dispute Over Beatles’ Never Before Released Tracks Is Not Over
Legal counsel for the Beatles filed a court case to avert the allocation of never-released recordings supposedly made during Ringo Starr’s first gig with the band.
The disagreement involving Apple Corps Ltd., the London-based faction created by the Beatles that facilitates the security of their legacy, and Fuego Entertainment Inc. of Miami Lakes, stems from recordings the Fab Four supposedly completed during a 1962 performance at the Star Club in Hamburg, Germany.
Eight never-released singles are assumed to be among the recordings, counting Paul McCartney playing Hank Williams’ Lovesick Blues and McCartney and John Lennon singing Ask Me Why.
Apple Corps maintains that the songs were recorded without the permission of the band and that Fuego and sister companies Echo-Fuego Music Group LLC and Echo-Vista Inc. have no approval to dispense them.
“This appears to us to be a garden-variety bootleg recording,” Paul LiCalsi, a lawyer for Apple Corps advised.
Nevertheless Fuego Entertainment claims that the recordings were lawfully made. “Don’t claim that these were just bootlegged,” said Fuego president Hugo Cancio. “It’s not like today that you just go in with a phone or a blackberry and you record.”
The complaint asserts that the recordings are inferior quality and that distributing them “dilutes and tarnishes the extraordinarily valuable image associated with the Beatles.”
Cancio maintains he had not been dished with a copy of the grievance, but that the filing requesting no less than $US15 million ($A16.46 million) in damages was not anticipated. “I’m surprised because up to a few weeks ago, we were in good-faith conversations with Apple,” he said.
Enumerated in the lawsuit is Jeffrey Collins, a partner of Cancio who attained the recordings. It’s uncertain how Collins get hold of the recordings.
Cancio planned to distribute the songs as Jammin’ with The Beatles and Friends, Star Club, Hamburg, 1962.
“It’s unfair to millions of Beatles fans not to allow this recording to be put out. The world deserves to hear these tracks,” he said.
“The fact is that we have it, they don’t and that is what’s bothering them.”
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