*Wednesday (07-26-17) was a good day for the Q, Quincy Jones. He was on the plus side of a judgement in his lawsuit against MJJ Productions and Sony.
Jones’ legal battle was for unpaid royalties on Michael Jackson’s three mega hit albums (Off The Wall, Thriller and Bad). The super producer successfully argued that accountants for the defendants screwed him out of dough he was owed for producing those records.
Jones claimed in the lawsuit that Jackson’s estate and Sony Music Entertainment owed him for music used in the concert film “This Is It” and two Cirque du Soleil shows that used Jackson’s songs.
Jones said the songs were improperly re-edited in order to deprive him of the royalties and production fees.
Mind you, he didn’t get what he was asking for which was in the neighborhood of $30 million, but $9.4 million ain’t nothing to sneeze at.
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Meanwhile, MJ’s estate says the judgement is “too much” and “unfair to Michael Jackson’s heirs.”
Here is what attorneys Howard Weitzman and Zia Modabber who represent the defendants had to say to TMZ about the judgement:
“While the jury denied Quincy Jones $21 million –- or more than two-thirds of what he demanded — we still believe that giving him millions of dollars that he has no right to receive under his contracts is wrong.”
“This would reinterpret the legal language in, and effectively rewrite, contracts that Mr. Jones lived under for more than three decades, admitted he never read, referred to as ‘contract, montract,’ and told the jurors he didn’t ‘give a damn’ about.”
“Any amount above and beyond what is called for in his contracts is too much and unfair to Michael’s heirs. Although Mr. Jones is portraying this as a victory for artists’ rights, the real artist is Michael Jackson and it is his money Mr. Jones is seeking.”
On the other hand, one could argue that Jones is an essential reason why the Michael Jackson estate has so much money in the first place. So let the man have the money and move on.
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