The Beastie Boys are digging in after reportedly losing money in a $1.7 million lawsuit victory over Monster Energy. Remaining embers Michael Diamond and Adam Horowitz — the late Adam "MCA" Yauch died in 2012 — are demanding $2.4 million more from the company after racking up excessive lawyers fees in the original case.
"Monster's tactics significantly increased the costs for Beastie Boys to vindicate their intellectual property rights, such that, absent an award of attorney's fees and costs, plaintiff's success at trial would become a Pyrrhic victory," the Beastie Boys's legal team wrote in their legal filing Saturday, Jan. 17, via Billboard.
Rolling Stone reports that Monster owned up to using four tracks — "Sabotage," "So What'cha Want," "Make Some Noise" and "Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun" — without authorization in a promotional video that was online for five weeks.
But the energy drink company countered the Beasties's desired $2.5 million with a $125,000 offer for the tracks's usage. That eventually led to the $1.7 million figure awarded by a jury.
You might remember the Boys went after GoldieBlox in 2013 when the company used "Girls" in one of its advertisements.
Yauch's will included the condition that the Beastie Boys could never license their music to endorse products, which has led to a crackdown on companies that do not ask permission. The company settled with GoldieBlox out of court last year.
In other news, the original video for "Too Many Rappers" recently dropped. Directed by Roman Coppola, it shows the Boys rapping with Nas in a supermarket and is likely the last music video Yauch ever shot. You can see his final YouTube moments below:
Readers: What do you make of the situation? Are the Boys right in asking for more money? Let us know what you think down in the comments section.
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