Cruachan has been a metal band in Ireland since 1992 and is currently signed on to a German label called Trollzorn. In 2011, the group released Blood On The Black Robe and in 2014 the group followed that up with Blood For The Blood God. I'm not super familiar with the group, so I assume this is some kind of extended storyline between two albums or a running thematic element. So what's the problem? According to Noisey, "Blood God" is a term owned by a German death metal band named Debauchery's singer Thomas Gurrath (a.k.a. The Bloodbeast, a.k.a Blutgott) and apparently this wasn't a problem until right now.
So sayeth the group via Facebook.
"He demanded all products be taken off shelves and nothing be sold with the words "Blood God" on it. Our label tried to reason with him because this is completely ridiculous, petty and childish. Cruachan and Debauchery are two completely different bands and the name "Blood God' is relevant to Irish mythology and history as that is how some people refer to Crom Cruach. We really see no reason why he had this mission to stop our albums being sold. He did not care what our label had to say," the statement continues. "As a result, our label have come to an agreement where we can sell off the existing Cruachan merchandise but can produce no more to sell in Germany. We plan to use the title Blood for Crom Cruach going forward for Germany only. He has also received a financial compensation as well. From now on we cannot make any more merchandise that has “Blood God” written on it. Cruachan have kept out of all of this and allowed the record label try and fix this issue. As they and Debauchery have reached an agreement we feel it was time to tell our fans what Thomas Gurrath has done to us."
Yes. The guy not only owns the term "Blood God," but almost refused to let the band use it in any way, shape or form. Granted, the whole thing was blown over in a matter of 10 hours, according to the band.
Earlier today we made a statement regarding legal issues with our new albums title "Blood for the Blood God". Since that statement Keith and Thomas Gurrath have been is discussions pretty much all day. Thomas has agreed to remove the block on our album title in Germany so we can sell our cd's and merch there with the proper album name. Thanks to Thomas for this and thanks for all the support we have received. We now ask that this is forgotten and no more negative comments are left regarding Debauchery, I feel Thomas made an error in judgement and has fixed it and for that we say thanks. Incidentally that means we have some, what will now become quite rare, "Blood for Crom Cruach" merchandise available atwww.trollzorn.de/store …. go get it now!!
Okay look. I get if you own something, you don't want people just using it at their leisure. That being said, here are my problems with this.
- It's not like the group named the album Blood God and were directly infringing upon Gurrath.
- Does Gurrath know metal and how common both of those words are? Clearly the guy has no problem just flat out causing trouble for someone who uses the two words next to each other, and where does that stop? Band names? Album names? Lyrics?
Again- I understand that it's "his" and he can do whatever he wants with it, but all this suing over names in metal is getting a little childish.
