Texas Band Sues I Am Second

This Will Destroy You, a Texas rock band who has seen their instrumental music make it to the big screen, to TV and to sports reels, is suing I Am Second in a Texas federal court. The band asserts that the evangelical group used their music without permission in some of the I Am Second stories. Specifically, they accuse the group of using 10 of their songs (or "sound-alike" versions) during I Am Second stories...

• A sound-alike version of "Freedom Blade" during the Lisa Luby Ryan testimony, the Janine Turner story and the Jarrett Stevens story
• "Quiet" during the Josh Hamilton (Los Angeles Angels outfielder) story and during the Brian "Head" Welch story
• "The World is Our _____." during the Tony Dungy (former Indianapolis Colts coach) story and the compilation story featuring several NASCAR drivers
• "There are Some Remedies Worse Than the Disease" during Pittsburg Steelers quarterback Landry Jones' story and NASCAR driver Darryl Waltrip's story
• "They Move on Tracks of Never-Ending Light" during Nate Larkin's story

The plaintiffs, Jeremy Galindo, Christopher King and Raymond Brown (This Will Destroy You members) and their record label, Magic Bullet Records, allege that E3 Partners Ministry has annual revenue of over $17 million and that the I Am Second campaign has gotten more than 1.5 billion media impressions worldwide. A portion of this revenue comes from DVD sales featuring I Am Second stories (and, as such, their music).

The lawsuit claims that E3 and their co-defendants, Audio Post Group LP, musician Brad Dale and Ditore-Meo Entertainment Co., did not seek, nor pay for, licenses from the band to use their music. "Instead, they appropriated plaintiffs' works, in whole, made them available to the world on the Internet, and sold videos using them through both online and brick-and-mortar retailers. To this day, despite e3's extraordinary economic performance, defendants have paid nothing to plaintiffs for such uses or sales, which are ongoing."

The suit further alleges that Brad Dale was familiar with This Will Destroy You's music because a band he was in opened for them. Thus, the "original music compositions" that he claimed to have created for I Am Second were not, in fact, his original creations. The band also states that Dallas Audio Post, which claims to have performed the "sound design, musical score and final mix" of the campaign for its client, Ditore-Meo, was party to the unlicensed use.

This Will Destroy You members are seeking damages for copyright infringement, saying that they earn "tens of thousands of dollars in licensing revenue" for limited uses of the band's songs, which have been featured in Olympic, Super Bowl and Academy Award broadcasts.

The damages in question that the plaintiffs seek are:

1. Temporary and permanent injunctive relief
2. Actual and statutory damages as allowed by law
3. Defendants’ profits as allowed by law
4. Costs and attorney's fees as provided by law
5. Impoundment as allowed by law
6. Prejudgment and postjudgment interest as allowed by law
7. Such other and further relief as the Court deems just and proper

The 10-page complaint was filed on October 25, 2013 in the United States District Court Northern District of Texas Dallas Division as Civil Action # 3:13-CV-4314. None of the celebrities featured in the videos are included in the lawsuit.

Tags : I am Second Brian "Head" Welch