30 Seconds to Mars and their glorious leader Jared Leto had better check the back of their sofas for loose change.
They may have to resort to begging, borrowing or even stealing to get through this one – being sued by Virgin Records for $30 million isn’t the kind of thing you can get by simply by using the cash you carry in your wallet. Maybe they could sell their instruments and equipment – though this would of course mean they can no longer play as a band…
So in other words, it would be win-win.
But why such a huge amount? Well, according to Virgin, Jared Leto and 30 Seconds to Mars were contracted to provide three albums, but didn’t. Apparently this is worth that much money to the company, so they’ve gone and sued that movie star from the band to get what they think is rightfully theirs.
$30 million though? Crikey.
And it seems it isn’t just hecklerspray that thinks the figure is a bit – shall we say – ‘excessive’. In a post on the official 30 Seconds to Mars forum, Jared wrote these words with his fingers, and possibly toes:
“So, as you may have heard we are being sued by our former record company for the ridiculously oversized, totally unrealistic and pretty silly (but slightly clever) sum of $30,000,000. Insane? Yea that’s what we said too.”
But what was the actual story behind it? Well, Messr Leto wasn’t about to leave his legion of 14-year-old female fans in the lurch when it came to the legalese, going on in the post:
“We had been signed to our record contract for nine years. Basically, under California law, where we live and signed our deal, one cannot be bound to a contract for more than seven years. This is widely known by all the record companies and has been for years. In fact, so aware of it are they that they desperately try to make deals outside of California whenever possible. It is a law that protects people from lengthy, unfair, career-spanning contracts. This law also gave us the legal right to explore other possible opportunities.”
And not one to leave it with a short, concise explanation of the matter – nor, seemingly, one to avoid underhanded bitchy comments, that one from Fight Club went on about a feud with more point than his last one:
“Yes we have been sued by EMI. But NOT for failing to deliver music or for ‘quitting.’ We have been sued by the corporation quite simply because roughly 45 days ago we exercised our legal right to terminate our old, out of date contract, which, according to the law is null and void. We terminated for a number of reasons, which we won’t go into here (we’d rather not air any dirty laundry) but basically our representatives could not get EMI to agree to make a fair and reasonable deal.”
To be fair, being sued for $30 million is probably a good enough reason to get at least a bit bitchy, and it’s the kind of thing that will make you feel as depressed as if you’ve been forced to sit and watch Requiem for a Dream 17 times in a row. Yes – that bad. So it is understandable that some complaints would be aired.
Shockingly enough, EMI (the group that owns Virgin Records) countered with some statementage of their own, offering these nuggets up:
“EMI’s relationship with 30STM has been extremely rewarding and successful for both the band and the company. The hard work of EMI’s global team and of the band has resulted in sales of three million albums and singles, multiple awards and a growing, global fan base.”
To be honest, you’d think that if they were suing a band for such an incredible amount of money they’d bother to write the full name out, not abbreviate it like it would take too much of their valuable lawsuit time up. Anyway, it went from amicable and half-written to some of the usual ‘we’re not an evil major label, honestly’ gubbins:
“However, we have been forced to take procedural, legal steps in order to protect EMI’s investment and rights during contract renegotiations initiated by the band and management. We hope to resolve these matters amicably and put them behind us so we can continue working in partnership with the band to take them to even greater levels of success.”
While it isn’t very fair for a band to go back on a contractual obligation, it does feel a bit like EMI are saying ‘either they come back to us and release more albums, thus making us money, or we get $30 million out of them anyway. Not like we’re trying to hold them hostage or anything’. A bit, at least. We mean – he may have missed out an album, but he’s given his blood for this band – is that not worth anything?
Well, no, probably not. But still.
We’re not exactly fans of 30 Seconds to Mars at hecklerspray, nor do we care much about Jared Leto and his face (apart from that bit in Fight Club), but… well… thirty million dollars? Are they shitting well kidding?!
If EMI expected to make that much money from a new album then they either have a severely skewed view of the world or there are far more fools with no taste buying music in this world than we originally thought.
Chris says
they should just make 2 really shit albums to keep virgin happy.
the first shit album worked that way
The Dread Pirate Sausage! says
I can’t understand celebrities sometimes.
They’re sweating $30M when all the need to do is bring their case before the Imperial Shogunate of Chinajapan. They’ve got a HUGE castle! If anyone gives them any lip, surely they’ll just issue a proper samurai beatdown and leave with the girl.
And the money.
What!
Janette says
The Rolling Stones (I think) did just that. Or maybe it was those Beatles. Anyway, whoever did it was successful in getting out of their contract.
Janette says
Wtf are you talking about.