Allman Brothers’ suit thrown out

A Los Angeles judge has thrown out a lawsuit by the Allman Brothers Band, ruling that the rockers waited too long to sue Universal Music Group for the return of a decade’s worth of their recordings.

The band claimed in its 2001 lawsuit that the recordings of live performances, demos and rehearsals made from 1969 to 1979 were for personal use and were not part of its Capricorn Records contract.

The tapes were among recordings stored in a warehouse whose contents was transferred to Polygram Records during Capricorn’s 1979 bankruptcy. Through a series of mergers of record companies, the tapes eventually ended up in the hands of Universal Music, now a unit of Vivendi Universal.

Superior Court Judge Judith Chirlin granted Universal’s motion to dismiss the suit on the grounds that the statute of limitations had expired on the band’s claims.