A chart-topping electronic dance group dumped their veteran managers—who have worked with top stars from Madonna to Lady Gaga and Bob Marley — without paying them a penny as soon as they became famous, according to a new lawsuit.
Managers Barbara Kennedy, who has crafted contracts for A-listers like Madonna and Ozzy Ozbourne, and Terry Casey, who has promoted bands like The Beatles and Bob Marley, claim the LA-based trio Krewella was “functionally and substantially unknown on the national music scene” before they groomed them.
Casey met the band’s two sisters Yasmine Yousaf and Jahan Yousaf at Austin Fashion Week in August 2010.
“They’re living out of a van,” the managers’ attorney, Jonathan Plaut told the Post.
“They don’t know anybody, nobody knows them. Terry and Kennedy work with them for over a year. They introduce them to Sony, to promoters, to Webster Hall,” Plaut said.
Just three years later their first album “Get Wet” took the number one spot in its genre.
Kennedy and Casey signed a six-year contract with the trio in Oct. 2011 and quickly rocketed them to stardom—booking an international tour, introducing them to Mariah Carey’s producer and securing a $400,000 Columbia Records deal.
Then suddenly in March 2012 the band emailed the managers claiming that they needed to “move on” without citing any grievances.
“So we do it all, then they write us a letter, ‘Dear manger, thanks you for all your work, we’re leaving you,’” Plaut recalled.
“Excuse me, yes you’re 21 years old but that doesn’t mean you can’t read!”
But the managers aren’t letting the upstarts off so easy—they want 20 to 25 percent commissions on all their income until 2016 when the contract was set to expire.
They also want the court to order Krewella to disclose how much money they’ve made since 2011.
John Rosenberg, the band’s attorney, said, “These allegations are entirely without merit and Krewella looks forward to vindicating their position in court.”