I think you mean “who declined to hear the case” or “denied the case a hearing.” (I suppose that later on, someone could have asserted that they had heard it, and they then denied hearing it. But I doubt that was what you meant to say.)

The “Bad” video wasn’t filmed on a set, it was filmed in an actual subway station in Brooklyn.

Also, “Cheese and Onions” used the melody of “Green Onion”, didn’t it?

Thanks as always for a great column!

The songs on the LP version of The Rutles are officially credited now to Lennon/McCartney/Innes. Lennon had warned Innes that he thought some of the songs were actionable, which is why “Get Up And Go” doesn’t appear on the original LP.

The Beatles all had different reactions to The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash. Harrison, of course, approved wholeheartedly (and it was Harrison that encouraged Innes to pursue a “reunion” that skewered Anthology to some extent). Ringo liked it, except that he felt the ending hit too close to home. Lennon loved it, and didn’t return the videotape he was given. McCartney did not like it, and Linda McCartney had to tell him that he was being too uptight and serious about it, and he ultimately approved.

Innes has recently released what he calls “the last Rutles song,” entitled “Imitation Song.”

I would love to see the Rutles songs be made available as DLC for The Beatles Rock Band. That might be a little too meta, much as The Fab Four (a Beatles tribute band) releasing a few Rutles covers as they did a few years ago. Still, it would be cool.

More curious, however is MF DOOM. He took his name from Dr Doom & performs in a metal masks. He’s used Dr Doom images on his album art. He’s used tons of samples from Fantastic Four & Spider-Man cartoons. As far as I know, he’s never had any trouble.

Does Marvel maybe letter hip hop artist get away with this because they figure it’s good marketing to an audience that generally doesn’t buy their products?

The thing is, he did do ‘Snack All Night’ in concert. And he did ‘Chicken Pot Pie’ in concert. He doesn’t release them on his albums.

I read an interview where he explained that the artists would be entitled to 50% of the money from his parody songs [presumably not all of the money, but whatever chunk is allocated to the songwriter], but he gets them to agree to a lesser fee (something like 10 or 20%). That’s part of his courtesy (and part of why Coolio got mad; if I remember right, Coolio is getting 50% after he complained). So, yeah, he’s a classy guy, but he also doesn’t want to have to pay reluctant artists 50% of the proceeds from a song, even though he’s legally entitled to record the song.

If we’re discussing music/comic books, there’s always McCartney and Wings’ “Magneto and the Titanium Man.”

*gets handed a note*

O my bad, a hockey player did it to Todd McFarlane already…..

Sometimes copyright issues get to be a bit much….

And ‘Vile and the Violators’ is a pretty obvious band name, so, I don’t think it seems that terribly likely that Vile is a Moore fan, or, at least that his stage and band names came about as a result of Moore fandom.

Actually, even if DC ever found out about that club, I doubt they’d sue. They’d likely win if they did, but who wants the horrible publicity that would come with suing a gay club over their name?