Paul McCartney has filed a federal lawsuit against Sony/ATV Music Publishing to reclaim the ownership of several hits he wrote with the Beatles.
McCartney is aiming to regain the rights to a total of 267 of the band’s tunes. Among these hits are “I Want To Hold Your Hand”, “All You Need is Love”, “Hey Jude”, and “Yesterday”.
According to Rolling Stone, McCartney’s legal team is citing the 1976 Copyright Act which states that the rights to works made before 1978 must be returned to their creators 56 years after the date of the original copyright. 56 years of Beatles hits are approaching rapidly for McCartney.
John Lennon and Paul McCartney first started writing songs together in 1962, and in 2018 it will be exactly 56 years. McCartney is hoping to recover the copyright interest by October 5, 2018. McCartney has been providing Sony/ATV with notifications since 2008, nearly ten years before the terminations become applicable.
Other notable artists such as Prince and Billy Joel have used the 1976 Copyright Act to help reclaim power over their music. During Sony/ATV’s recent dispute with U.K. band Duran Duran, the band filed a similar suit, and English court ruled that American laws came second to Great Britain. In light of this event, McCartney filed the lawsuit in a New York federal court.