REMEMBER, THE LABELS CARE ABOUT THEIR STARS

At this stage, it's only allegations, but two large US promoters are suing Universal for "forcing them to submit fake invoices". The companies - National Music Marketing and Majestic Promotions - say that when they refused, Universal told radio stations not to do business with them.

So far, Universal haven't responded to the claims of fraud, racketeering, trade libel and breach of contract; the promoters' lawyers, though, are being quite gabby:

"What [Universal] was doing was defrauding their artists - some of their biggest artists.

"I'm sure Nelly is not going to be too happy that they were taking money out of his promotion budget to pay for promotions for other artists - money that he had to pay back from his royalties."

We're sure it'll all turn out to be a terrible misunderstanding - after all, Universal is part of the RIAA, who constantly lecture us all on how downloading music is stealing from their artists. Unless... it couldn't be they don't want us to steal off their roster because it leaves less for them to plunder, could it?

music riaa universal fraud