The advocacy organization airs its support of the Radio Music Licensing Committee.
The National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) has thrown its proverbial hat in the ring in the ongoing legal battle between the Radio Music Licensing Committee (RMLC) and Irving Azoff’s performing rights organization Global Music Rights (GMR).
The RMLC, which negotiates licensing fees for around 10,000 U.S. radio stations representing roughly 90 percent of the U.S. market, sued GMR in 2016 for setting “extortionate” licensing rates for its artists, which include such powerful figures as Bruce Springsteen, Drake, Pharrell Williams and Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder (GMR subsequently filed its own suit against the RMLC for illegally capping licensing fees paid to songwriters). The two parties have since been operating under an interim licensing agreement pending a legal resolution.
On Jan. 14, the NAB filed a Motion for Leave to File Amicus Curiae Brief with the U.S. District Court in California, asking the court to allow them — a non-party to the litigation — to weigh in on the case. The request, along with the accompanying brief, criticized the Department of Justice’s December 2019 brief in support of GMR, which was launched by Azoff in 2013 as an alternative to ASCAP and BMI, the long-established performing rights organizations that sell music licenses to radio stations. In that brief, the DOJ suggested that the RMLC had been engaging in anti-competitive practices.