Stone Temple Pilots Sue Scott Weiland
The split between the Stone Temple Pilots and former frontman Scott Weiland has escalated into a legal feud. The Associated Press reports that the band filed a lawsuit accusing Weiland of misusing the band’s name in to advance his solo work and asked a judge to block him from using the band’s name and their songs.
The lawsuit, which was filed on Friday in Los Angeles, claims that Weiland’s chronic tardiness and struggles with addiction had hurt the band’s earning potential when he was a member. It also claims that Weiland, who was fired from the band in February, has attempted to interfere with airplay of the band’s new single: According to the suit, Weiland’s lawyer had called the head of programming at LA radio station KROQ and told them that they would be infringing on Weiland’s rights if the station played the STP song “Out of Time.”
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The band claims in the suit that they own the rights to the name Stone Temple Pilots, as well as all the group’s songs, copyrights and trademarks, citing agreements made in 1996 and 2010 that no former members can use the Stone Temple Pilots name. STP has asked the judge to stop Weiland from performing STP songs in his solo career, or even calling himself a former member of the band.
At the KROQ Weenie Roast last week, the band made their appearance with a new frontman, Linkin Park’s Chester Bennington. In an open letter to fans posted Friday on his website, Weiland wrote about learning of the new configuration. “To tell you the truth, it took me by surprise. And it hurt,” he wrote.
“But the band that played last weekend was not Stone Temple Pilots and it was wrong of them to present themselves as that. First of all they don’t have the legal right to call themselves STP because I’m still a member of the band. And more importantly, they don’t have the ethical right to call themselves Stone Temple Pilots because it’s misleading and dishonest to the millions of fans that have followed us for so many years.”