News!... Jimi Hendrix... Karl J. Geisler...


Al Hendrix wins suit!

The following reports were posted on Hey Joe on July 28, 1995.

According to the San Francisco Examiner home page....

SEATTLE - The rights to the music of legendary rock guitarist Jimi Hendrix, valued at tens of millions of dollars, will return to his family under a lawsuit settlement announced Tuesday.

The rights to the music, name and likeness of the 1960s acid rock star have been entangled in litigation since 1993, when Hendrix's father and sole heir, Al, sued the family's longtime legal advisor, charging mismanagement of the singer's legacy.

The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Seattle, where Hendrix was born, effectively blocked sale of the rights to MCA Records for a reported $50 million to $75 million.

Al Hendrix's lawyer, Yale Lewis, said the rights, which include the master disks to Hendrix's music, were worth closer to $90 million.

Under the settlement, Al Hendrix will get a lump sum payment of unspecified back royalties when the agreement is finalized next month and then will get rights to all royalties going forward.

The settlement also provides for the Hendrix family to pay an unspecified amount over time to settle certain counter-suits, Lewis said. Lawyers on both sides declined to release further details of the settlement.

Since Hendrix's death in 1970 of drug-related causes at age 27, his electrified blues-rock has remained popular, reaching new audiences through releases such as last year's "Jimi Hendrix: Woodstock" from MCA, which was ranked among Billboard magazine's top 40 albums less than a year ago.

Funding for the litigation was provided through an interest-free loan from Microsoft Corp. co-founder and billionaire Paul Allen, a devoted Hendrix fan.

A spokesman for Allen said the litigation cost $5 million, which the family was asked to repay only if they prevailed.

According to AP...

Alan Douglas, As a result of the agreement, will no longer maintain ownership rights over any of the musical releases he's overseen since Hendrix's death. He will complete work on a soundtrack album and a documentary of Jimi Hendrix's career entitled ``A Room Full of Mirrors.'' It will be up to Al Hendrix and his representatives to decide what to do with the works.

The Electronic Telegraph Thursday 27 July 1995 World News

Father wins legal battle for Hendrix millions

By Hugh Davies in Washington

THE 76-year-old father of Jimi Hendrix won the rights yesterday to his dead son's music, estimated to be worth more thanESC(I#ESC(J50 million. Al> Hendrix's victory comes after years of legal wrangling to sort out the financial mess the rock guitarist was in when he died 25 years ago after overdosing on sleeping pills in a girlfriend's flat in London.

At the time, his vast earnings were going into Bahamian tax shelters. Aides and managers took sizeable percentages and he was forced to tour America and Britain repeatedly to avoid bankruptcy.

His father, a retired landscape gardener in Seattle, has been fighting as the sole heir to gain control of the assets.

Interest in Jimi Hendrix and his music has continued and his grave has become a shrine for grunge music followers.

Although Hendrix was always more popular in Britain than in America - his only real hit in America was a blistering version of Bob Dylan's All Along the Watchtower, which struggled to No 20 in 1968 - global sales of his albums still produce more thanESC(I#ESC(J2 million annually in royalties.

Spin-offs such as photographs, T-shirts and films, generate another ESC(I#ESC(J700,000.

Hendrix was discovered by the veteran guitarist Les Paul in a New Jersey nightclub. His death - suffocating on his own vomit at the age of 27 - illustrated the rock maxim that living fast and dying young is incredibly lucrative for record companies.

More of his recordings were released posthumously than in his lifetime. Rolling Stone magazine christened him the "greatest guitarist of all time".

There has even been a ghoulish Hendrix: On the Road Again tour, with fans invited into a 64 ft tractor-trailer to watch films, listen to music and "play guitar with Jimi" via a computer.

His father, who bought him his first guitar on credit, claims that he collected less thanESC(I#ESC(J1.3 million in the last two decades. He started legal action that was due to begin in a federal court this week.

He has agreed to drop a fraud suit against a Los Angeles civil rights lawyer he hired to sort out the muddle of the estate.

An agreement gives him all of his son's property, including the song catalogue and master tapes of his recordings, in return for various large payments to sort out old contracts.

Al Hendrix, who still lives in a modest home, has a pacemaker in his chest and suffers from arthritis, said: "I am elated. Jimi would be happy to know we won this thing and got it all back."