Field Dispatch
Cher vs. Mary Bono | Matt Connarton Unleashed
Speaker 1: Some quick music news I saw pop up. This is
Speaker 1: from digital Musicnews dot com. And I did not know
Speaker 1: that this was going on. But Mary Bono files appeal
Speaker 1: following momentous Share copyright victory. I had no idea that
Speaker 1: this was happening, that Mary Bono, Sonny Bono's widow, was
Speaker 1: actually fighting with Cher, who was also married to Sonny Bono.
Speaker 1: Of course, over there's always Here's the thing about the
Speaker 1: music industry, there's one thing you can always count on.
Speaker 1: Someone is always doing somebody for something, it says here.
Speaker 1: Sonny Bono's widow, Mary files an appeal following a federal
Speaker 1: judge's ruling last year that Share is still entitled to
Speaker 1: fifty percent of the proceeds from her nineteen sixties hits
Speaker 1: with Sonny. Of course, everyone knows Sonny and Chair. Even
Speaker 1: you youngins have probably heard of Sonny and Share at
Speaker 1: least before. Before Share was the hugely successful solo artist
Speaker 1: that she became, she was, of course, one half of
Speaker 1: the duo Sonny and Share, it says here. Last year,
Speaker 1: a federal judge ruled the Chare is still entitled to
Speaker 1: half of the publishing proceeds from her early hits with
Speaker 1: her ex Sonny Bono, including I Got You Babe. Everyone
Speaker 1: knows that song, right, I Got You Babe? Forgive me
Speaker 1: for singing? Now. A year and a half later, Sonny's widow,
Speaker 1: Mary Bono, has filed an appeal. Mary has been trying
Speaker 1: to stop paying royalties to Share under so called termination rights,
Speaker 1: under which artists and their heirs can gain back control
Speaker 1: of intellectual property years after signing it away. But last year,
Speaker 1: a federal judge ruled that termination rights do not apply
Speaker 1: to Sonny and SHARE's nineteen seventy eight a divorce settlement,
Speaker 1: which entitled Share to a fifty percent cut of publishing
Speaker 1: revenue from hits like I Got You Babe, The Beat
Speaker 1: Goes On and Baby Don't Go in perpetuity. In May
Speaker 1: twenty twenty four, California Federal US District Judge John A.
Speaker 1: Cronstat ruled in Cher's favor, but the decision wasn't made
Speaker 1: official until a final judgment that was entered just last month.
Speaker 1: That judgment was appealed by Mary Bono's attorney, Daniel shacked Shat,
Speaker 1: to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday, December
Speaker 1: twenty second. Mary Bono has argued she should be able
Speaker 1: to invoke her termination rights to cancel Sunny's assignment of
Speaker 1: royalties to Share in the divorce settlement, but Judge Cronstatt
Speaker 1: ruled that the divorce agreement was a contract for financial compensation,
Speaker 1: not a grant of intellectual property that would be subject
Speaker 1: to termination, writing that quote a right to receive royalties
Speaker 1: is distinct from a grant of copyright unquote, so it
Speaker 1: says a shat told Billboard quote Judge Cronstat's got the
Speaker 1: law wrong on copyright term nations. His ruling, if left standing,
Speaker 1: will hurt songwriters and creators by allowing not just former spouses,
Speaker 1: but also publishers and labels to circumvent the Copyright Act
Speaker 1: and keep shares of royalties even after termination unquote, he
Speaker 1: said at the time of the judges ruling last year.
Speaker 1: By the way, and Share was also in the news
Speaker 1: recently for this Share was the musical guest on Saturday
Speaker 1: Night Live last weekend, while Ariana Grande hosted the episode.
Speaker 1: But the seventy which is unusual, by the way, you
Speaker 1: would think because it's not I mean, it's not super common,
Speaker 1: but occasionally you'll have a musical guest and a host
Speaker 1: be the same person, you know, like you might have
Speaker 1: Riyana Grande, because obviously she's a musician. You might have
Speaker 1: her host and be the musical guest, you know, pulling
Speaker 1: double duty. You see that once in a while, but
Speaker 1: they didn't do that this time. Chare was the musical guest.
Speaker 1: The seventy nine year old has been accused of lip
Speaker 1: syncing during her performance of her twenty twenty three Christmas
Speaker 1: track DJ Play a Christmas song, which left some fans disappointed.
Speaker 1: Eddie and I thought the same thing as we were
Speaker 1: watching it. Is she lip syncing it? Did? It? Did
Speaker 1: appear that way? She isn't even singing. One person complained
Speaker 1: on x this is some of the worst lip syncing
Speaker 1: I've ever seen, regardless. I mean, even if she was
Speaker 1: singing live, there was a lot of processing on her voice.
Speaker 1: And I know her her huge monster hit song was
Speaker 1: it Believe Do you Believe in Life After Love? You know?
Speaker 1: That was like that's like got the auto tune dialed
Speaker 1: all the way up on that song, and that kind
Speaker 1: of became like her sound there in that moment. I
Speaker 1: mean auto tune obviously during that period was used a lot.
Speaker 1: It still is, I mean, but used like obviously where
Speaker 1: you're actually supposed to hear the auto tune. That kind
Speaker 1: of became the style and the vibe for a little while.
Speaker 1: And you know, I think it sounds horrible and I
Speaker 1: hate that song for that reason anyway. But yeah, so
Speaker 1: some legal news, and of course the lip syncing. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, the lip syncing thing, Well, that'll blow over.
Speaker 1: Nobody really cares that much. I'll tell you what. For
Speaker 1: seventy nine years old, she still moves really well, so
Speaker 1: I'll give her that. But I don't think she was
Speaker 1: actually singing. But again, that's not a big deal. But
Speaker 1: the legal wrangling, I didn't even know that that was
Speaker 1: going on, that there was ongoing litigation between Mary Bono,
Speaker 1: who was who Sonny was married to at the time
Speaker 1: of his death, and Share. I did not know about that,
Speaker 1: so that's interesting to me.
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