Solar, the avowed partner-turned-hip-hop pariah, is back in the courts, and DJ Premier is again the target. The contentious producer, whose divided role in the late Guru's last years still divides opinions, has gone to court to file a brand new suit against Premo for using the Gang Starr name and logo without authorization. He's also seeking a cut of the money generated under the iconic brand.
In new court papers, Solar, whose given name is Manley Buchanan, alleges that he, along with Ill Kid Music Inc., Guru Productions Inc., and unnamed other defendants, is benefiting financially from Gang Starr's legacy while leaving him out of the picture and its profits. The suit charges copyright and trademark violations as well as failure to pay royalties for music Solar claims to have originated or to which rights are owed.
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For reference, Solar was Guru's collaborator in the rapper's last years, with his name attached to multiple efforts, including co-founding the record label 7 Grand, the 2003 album The Ownerz by Gang Starr, the previous year's posthumous release One of the Best Yet, and the song "Battle" of the 8 Mile soundtrack. Based on those contributions, Solar asserts that he owns (or at least has partial rights to) Gang Starr's intellectual property.
This isn't Solar's first legal tangle with Premier or Guru's estate. Following Guru's death in 2010, the courts intervened to decide who owned Gang Starr's legacy. In a 2014 judgment, Solar was found to have lied, and it was ruled that he had no ownership of Guru's creative output, recordings, or trademarks, which include Gang Starr and Jazzmatazz. Indeed, the court specifically prohibited him from using or transferring those trademarks, except to Guru's estate.
An appeal tinkered with other parts of the ruling; some restrictions came off, and payments shrank, but the heart of the ruling remained. In December 2024, a judge permanently threw out Solar's central claims, including trademark infringement and unfair competition. But Solar didn't back down. Instead, he's returning for another fight.
He is again asking the court to award him damages, stop Premier from using the disputed material in the future, and cover his legal fees. He says Premier still uses his contributions and hasn't given him proper credit or compensation.
Trademark records indicate that Solar's several attempts to secure the right to legally use the Gang Starr name have been unsuccessful. He applied for it in 2011 and again in 2021. Both cases were dismissed. The brands are now "dead."
But even as Solar has faced court losses and withering attention about his time with Guru at the end, including accusations of isolation and manipulation, which he denies, he's moving ahead. Whether this latest lawsuit will get anywhere is anybody's guess; 15 years after Guru's death, Solar's ongoing legal pursuit continues.
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