Legal conflict between Avenged Sevenfold and Warner Bros.

After releasing four studio albums for Warner Bros. Records since 2005, California rockers Avenged Sevenfold are trying to get out of their as-yet-unfulfilled recording contract, citing the state’s famous “seven-year rule.”

In turn, the label has filed a breach-of-contract suit against the hard rock act, seeking compensatory damages.

The “seven-year rule” of the California Labor Code allows parties to leave personal service contracts under certain circumstances after seven years have passed. Upon record industry lobbying, the 70-year-old law was amended in the 1980s to allow record companies to claim lost profits on uncompleted albums. Record companies, though, only have 45 days to do so when an artist exercises the right to terminate.

“Avenged Sevenfold recently exercised the rights given them by this law and ended its recording agreement with Warner Bros. Records,” the band’s attorney Howard E. King said in a statement. Since the 2004 contract was signed, King says the label “underwent multiple regime changes that led to dramatic turnover at every level of the company, to the point where no one on the current A&R staff has even a nodding relationship with the band.”

Source: Billboard