News

The BBC reports the English High Court has decided in favor of Pink Floyd in a dispute the band has been engaged in with its long-time record label EMI.

At issue is whether the label has the right to sell Floyd’s tracks individually online. The ruling could remove Floyd’s catalog from the iTunes Music Store and the like.

The band had maintained its contract prohibits EMI from selling its tracks piecemeal without band permission, and this contract, agreed upon before the advent of MP3, included online sales.

EMI disagreed, saying the word “record” in the contract meant a physical thing that didn’t apply to digital files sold online.

The court today sided with the band, which wasn’t present to hear the ruling, saying the contract guarantees to preserve the “artistic integrity” of the band’s albums, which prevented so-called “unbundled” sales of individual tracks without the Floyd’s say-so.

EMI has been ordered to pay $60,000, but, in a statement, said, “Today’s judgment does not require EMI to cease making Pink Floyd’s catalogue available as single track downloads, and EMI continues to sell Pink Floyd’s music digitally and in other formats.”

This latest court ruling is part of a much larger long-running dispute between the band and label over approximately $15 million in allegedly unpaid royalties.

News agency Reuters reports that Pink Floyd today took legal action against its long-time record label EMI. The point of contention is EMI’s online sales of individual Floyd tracks and royalty calculations of the same.

Floyd attorney Robert Howe told London’s High Court the band has contractual protection against EMI’s selling of its tracks piecemeal, a practice known as “unbundling.”

According to Howe, EMI believes that agreement is limited to “physical product and doesn’t apply online.”

Floyd’s back catalog is the second most popular in the world, next to The Beatles’.

As we reported previously, the March 21 episode of CBS-TV’s “Cold Case” will feature several songs by Pink Floyd.

Today, Capitol/EMI, the band’s label, released more details about the broadcast.

In the episode, titled “Flashover,” the missing Nick Vera (Jeremy Ratchford) is concerned team members realize he’s finally hit rock bottom and hopes a new twist to a 2006 arson case, which Vera was secretly obsessing about in recent weeks, might supply quick leads to his whereabouts.

Glenn Morshower (”24″) plays a fire marshal who partnered with Vera on the arson/homicide case in 2006, and Patrick Gallagher (”Glee”) portrays a bartender at a bar where Vera’s recently become a regular.

The episode was written by Greg Plageman, one of the series’ executive producers, and was directed by Jeannot Szwarc.

“Pink Floyd’s music is so sonically and texturally rich it demands your attention, and nothing about this episode is lean-back television,” said Plageman. “The Floyd tracks we chose seem to perfectly complement the slide of Detective Nick Vera into a personal abyss.

“We also love that one of their most famous album covers, ‘Wish You Were Here’ — of two men on fire shaking hands (Actually only one is on fire -fs) — was shot right here on the Warner Bros. Lot 35 years ago, right next to our actual ‘Cold Case’ soundstages.

“So, we thought that it would be great symmetry to play the title track over the final montage.”

Past music-themed episodes of “Cold Case” have featured the music of Ray Charles, John Lennon, Frank Sinatra, Nirvana, Johnny Cash, John Mellencamp, Bruce Springsteen, Tim McGraw, U2, Bob Dylan, Santana, Bob Seger, The Doors and Pearl Jam.

Pink Floyd fans know it best as that dark, hulking presence underneath the floating pig on the cover of the 1977 “Animals” album.

Londoners have come to know it as an eyesore — albeit, an historic one.

But the Battersea Power Station, out of commission since 1983, might be another step closer to a new life as a center for housing, office and retail space.

A whopping $8.2 billion redevelopment plan set forth by architect Rafael Viñoly has received approval by London mayor Boris Johnson, and the U.K.’s Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment. The proposal is now being reviewed by the city’s planning department.

If it goes forward, the plan would include 3,700 homes, 1.6 million square feet of office space, 500,000 square feet of retail space, and an environmentally-friendly carbon-free power plant built underground.

Battersea has to be one of the only decommissioned power plants in the world with its own Web site and newsletter.

These architectural renderings come from the Rafael Viñoly Architects PC Web site.

According to the Pink Floyd Facebook page, CBS-TV will air a Pink Floyd-themed episode of “Cold Case” on Sunday, March 21.

The previously-reported date of March 14 was incorrect.

The episode, titled “Flashover,” will include extracts of seven Floyd songs: “Comfortably Numb,” “Hey You,” “Mother,” “Marooned,” “Wish You Were Here,” “Time” and “The Thin Ice.”

The 60-minute show airs at 10 p.m. EST. Set your DVR …

EMI yesterday denied reports it’s looking to sell its iconic Abbey Road recording facility, where loads of renowned bands, including Pink Floyd, have recorded over the years.

Terra Firma, which has owned EMI since 2007, said in a release that it’s “holding preliminary discussions for the revitalization of Abbey Road with interested and appropriate third parties.”

However, it added, selling the studios to a third party is not its goal.

When news broke last week it caused a flurry of protests, including the formation of an organization calling itself Save Abbey Road Studios. The group, comprised of studio employees, musicians, and fans, put online a petition to build support to save the facility from redevelopment.

The petition is still online.

(Pictured: Floyd drummer Nick Mason and Rolling Stone Bill Wyman playing at Abbey Road Studios for the “All You Need Is Love” charity single last autumn. Read more about the single.)

A couple days ago, we reported the planned sale of EMI’s legendary recording facilities on Abbey Road, London, to raise much-needed cash for the label’s parent company.

That same day a group of studio employees, musicians and fans formed Save Abbey Road Studios! to try and keep the property a working recording facility. The group’s fear: The facility will be converted into a museum of some sort, or, worse, luxury housing.

The group’s put a petition on its Web site that’s, so far, gathered 249 electronic signatures in support of its mission.

You can lend your support and sign the petition here.

Despite notoriety for once wearing a home-made T-shirt that read “I hate Pink Floyd,” Sex Pistol Johnny Lydon said in an interview published today he’d like to re-do the Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon.”

The Stool Pigeon interview, teased today at sister publication Web site The Quietus, quotes Lydon as saying, “You’d have to be daft as a brush to say you didn’t like Pink Floyd. They’ve done great stuff. They’ve done rubbish too. ‘Dark Side of the Moon’ I love.”

He goes on to say an invite was on the table for him to join Floyd — we presume he means Roger Waters — on stage at a 2008 Los Angeles gig.

Read the full excerpt at The Quietus.

The London studio where Pink Floyd recorded extensively — including sessions for “Dark Side of the Moon,” “Wish You Were Here” and many others — is up for sale.

The sale is expected to raise tens of thousand of pounds for Terra Firma, the investment firm that in 2007 bought the financially-troubled EMI record label, which owns the property.

Loads of bands have recorded at the facility, including, most famously, The Beatles, who named their 1969 album after the St. John’s Wood street where the studios are located.

By the way, be careful crossing the street. It’s busy.

“Like TiVo® for radio” is the most common way we hear it described.

We’re talking about the RadioTime online directory, combined with software such as RedButton (Windows) or Rogue Amoeba’s Radioshift™ (Mac), which allows you to schedule recordings of radio shows for listening later.

As the Random Precision Radio Network expands — five affiliate stations so far — we’ve turned to RadioTime to help us track our growing number of air dates and times for our weekly “Floydian Slip” show in a single space.

The real power of the directory comes when you combine it with one of many software or hardware products that use the directory to allow listeners to schedule weekly recordings of the program.

Desktop recording is just one option. Many mobile solutions allow you to tune in, capture streams and listen later on your cellphone.

We have no affiliation with Radiotime or any of the products it powers, but wanted to give them a shoutout as a great way to make sure you don’t miss a single episode of “Floydian Slip.”