Springsteen Wins Early Songs

A U.S. District Court Judge awarded Bruce Springsteen copyright control of an album of songs he composed and recorded between 1970 and 1972, dismissing a suit filed against Springsteen by Pony Express Records, who attempted to gain control of the songs' rights.

The songs were held for two decades by a former Springsteen manager. In the early Nineties, he sold them to Pony Express, without the artist's permission; the songs were subsequently licensed to a British label. Pony Express released the songs as an album titled Before the Fame.

In 1998, Springsteen won a court battle that granted him control of the album in the U.K., a ruling that helped helped shape the new ruling, by U.S. District Court Judge Harold Ackerman in Newark, N.J. As a result of Ackerman's ruling, Pony Express has been ordered to stop selling the recording and to destroy existing copies. Springsteen still plans to seek damages based on court costs and copies already sold.

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Song Stories

“All Along the Watchtower”

The Jimi Hendrix Experience | 1968

Jimi Hendrix got hold of Bob Dylan's early John Wesley Harding tapes and in late 1967 recorded a version of "All Along the Watchtower" with the Experience in London. Dissatisfied with that first development, Hendrix brought those tapes with him to New York in early 1968 when he began work on Electric Ladyland. Eddie Kramer, Hendrix's engineer at the time, told Rolling Stone that Hendrix "was still looked upon by his basically white audience as the mammoth black guitar hero. There was a constant fight within him to expand himself." Hendrix's successful take on Dylan's work has long been recognized by the songwriter. "I liked Jimi Hendrix's record of this and ever since he died I've been doing it that way," Dylan wrote in the liner notes to his Biograph box set. "Strange how when I sing it, I always feel it's a tribute to him in some kind of way."

More Song Stories entries »

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