Bill Sagen, owner of the website Wolfgangs Vault which is being sued by surviving members of Grateful Dead, Led Zeppelin and the Doors as well as Carlos Santana, has called the lawsuit 'frivolous".
Sagen purchased the assets of concert promoter Bill Graham and has been replicating the items for sale through the Wolfgang's Vault website.Sagen's lawyer Michael Elkin has released a statement saying that "the lawsuit has nothing to do with artists' rights and everything to do with others in the industry seeking to seize profits and shakedown Wolfgang's Vault and its owner, Bill Sagan. We believe while this lawsuit will attract a lot of headlines it has no basis or fact in law whatsoever. Wolfgang's Vault bought all of this decades' old material legally, paid their rightful owner and own all the rights necessary to conduct its business. We fully expect to be victorious in the court of law."
However, Elkin's logic is misplaced. While Sagen may have legally purchased the assets of Graham, it is highly unlikely that the purchase will have also given him license to replicate the sounds and images of the artists involved.
Elkin argues that "the industry is never happy when fans can get music for free. Yet millions of dollars were spent for Mr. Graham's archive, and that purchase price included not just the photography, posters and handbills but also the recordings, as invaluable and as irreplaceable as they all are. Furthermore the purchase allowed the company the rights to open the archive as they deemed fit. Wolfgang's Vault is determined that the vault remains open, and intends to do everything in its power to keep it that way."
Legal opinion is that Sagen does not have the right to reproduce any of the items without the permission of each artist. This permission was clearly not granted considering the lawsuit against him.
At the time of publication, the Wolfgang's Vault website was still open for business.
