Perplexing situation guys

Here's a background story.

My dad and my Uncle Paul are musicians. My dad plays guitar, and my uncle plays piano. they've been in a band for years and years, and had gone through name changes, and people leaving/joining the band...you know the usual stuff...Well Back in the Mid 80's (I'd say between 83 and 87) The name was Starbound. The genre is 80's funk (like the stuff that's played on Fever 105 in GTA: Vice City) Here's a Picture
http://files.automotiveforums.com/gallery/watermark.php?file=/500/4865starbound_real1.jpg

My dad is the one wearing the black shirt, and my uncle is in the blue suit. the drummer's name is Richie Furr, he's the one at the bottom with the 'fro, and he's still with the band. The other two at the top had left the band and had lost contact with the rest of the band.

In 1985, they had released a single called "We Can Make It" , it had gotten beaten out by Menudo in the July 1895 issue of Billboard, in the top 10 mostly played singles.

The reason as to why they broke up? simple, the agent was a dick and didn't push the album hard enough. He was taking their money and they were missing out on crucial opportunities to make it big, to which they had almost done.

pan 20 years later.....

a couple of nights ago, i had found an old 45rpm record of their single. it's old, warped, and broken in some areas, so i can't play it. I had said to myself "What the hell" and for shits and giggles, i had googled up their name + their single........i wasn't expecting any results, but i had found these....
http://www.terra.es/personal2/eruiter/images/Large/Starbound.jpgsweet a 33 of Starbound!!!, but wait!!!! what is this?! MADE IN BELGIUM?!WTF?!?!?!:eek7: This was recorded at Critique Records in Reading,Massachusets!
but wait it gets even more bizarre.
i had also found thishttp://funkyadog.web.infoseek.co.jp/lp.files/starbound.jpg
look closely...JAPANESE WRITING?!
pics aside, i had also found the recond on sale in Europe for 50 Euros (about 70 U.S Dollars) and on a 80's funk compilation cd in England for 15 pounds!

now here's the ugly part.
for 20 years, we hadn't known anything of Starbound's overseas audience. that means 20 years of royalties that we haven't even recieve My dad, my uncle Paul, and Richie are extremely pissed off, because they had copywritten this song, and they had cut ties with the shitty agent, but yet it seems like the agent/company decided to make money off of their name and their song. My mom had told me that we would have been able to buy a house a lot earlier than we had before, because they had all pooled their money together for $1,500 Recording sessions (more than one) in hopes of becoming big..

fucked up isn't it?

I heard that "Starbucks" coffee wanted to use "Starbound" .. but unfortunately it was already taken. :lol:

Dang man that sucks. Could the other band memebers that left and they've lost contact with have had something to do with it too? Why are people so damn greedy in this world? It makes me sick.

Bean (the one on the upper-left with the S-curl ) didn't have anything to do with the composition or production of the song. Kevin Parham (upper-right) on the other hand had helped with the production, but the thing is, i don't think that he did it, because he left before the rest of Starbound cut ties with the agent.

Sad but it happens... My grandfather was shafted out of well over $1m he'd amassed abroad by the late 80's by his lawyer just before he passed away. You just have to accept it and hope that some day you come across the piece of scum that screwed you over.

My mom got screwed over by a guy that left her business and illegally ran with some of the designs, making >$100k/piece. We found out that he laytr died of brain tumors. Weird. Ever since my dad died, everyone that has tried to fuck us over has ended up dead. Kinda freaky......

My dad's gotten screwed out of tons of money too. Which is why he ended up starting his own company. He was a salesman, and selling more than anyone and if the reason they screwed him is b/c the president of the company could stand the fact that one of his salesmen would be make more than him. Fucking cheapskate.

OMG! That's sooo cool.

I wanna take that record and play it +12 to about 140bpm and add some bass. :thumbsup:

SUE!!!
They made that song, they deserve the money. Get it, no matter what it takes.

So what r u gonna do about it? Or what's your dad and uncle gonna due there Hogie?

Yeah, if you could find the guy, I'm sure you could sue him.

my dad and my uncle want to purchase the cd and record from overseas, do tons of reasearch , pool some money together to hire a lawyer, and then sue the companies who had been using their song.....


hell i wanna find the agent myself and pummel him with brass knuckles....