Former singer and a founding member of the Winnipeg band, The Guess Who has been fighting with Gary Peterson and Jim Kale who are also founding members and have been touring under the name, The Guess who.
Randy Bachman and Burton Cummings have filed a lawsuit claiming the band is touring under the name. The Guess Who is misleading to their audience because Randy Bachman and Burton Cummings are not there.
Burton has gone through performance rights organizations such as the Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada (SOCAN) and removed the copyright protections that allow acts to play the songs live in concert. Concert venues would be liable for damages if an act performed one of Burton Cummings songs.
So now whenever his songs are played, the venue and the band are liable to be sued.
The band has recently canceled several shows.
By doing this Burton Cummings is no longer getting royalties from his music
That’s a gutsy move in my opinion, giving up royalties to prove a point.
