Elvis Presley rights holders and Eminem's publisher sue Suno, federal court filings show

Rights holders for Elvis Presley’s music and the publisher of many of Eminem’s songs filed separate lawsuits against AI music generator Suno on Friday, Nov. 6, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, according to court dockets and reports by Variety and The Verge.

The Presley suit, case No. 3:26-cv-13398, was brought by Elvis Presley Enterprises, LLC; ABG EPE IP LLC; the Luigi Creatore Trust and Claire Creatore and Stephen Chapman as trustees; the Susan T. Aberbach Revocable Trust and Susan T. Aberbach as trustee; the Decedents Exempt Trust created under the Anne-Rachel Aberbach Family Trust and Steven Lee as trustee; Jason Simeon Aberbach; Abilene Music LLC; Karen Zimmerman; Janice MacDowell; Helene Kaye; Karen Kaye Lee; Steven Baum; Melissa Ferrick; Lori Zimmerman; and Raleigh Music Publishing LLC. The 51-page complaint claims Suno violated Tennessee’s Ensuring Likeness Voice and Image Security Act, known as the ELVIS Act, by letting users generate tracks that mirror Presley’s “rich vocal timbre” without permission. The ELVIS Act is a 2024 law aimed at AI voice cloning. The complaint also brings a Tennessee common law right of publicity claim and copyright claims. It lists 859 Presley and other works and says statutory damages of up to $150,000 per work willfully infringed would total $128.85 million.

In the second suit, case No. 3:26-cv-13399, Eight Mile Style and Martin Affiliated allege Suno copied 269 Eminem compositions, including “Lose Yourself” and “The Real Slim Shady,” to train its generator and lets users produce songs and lyrics that mirror them, according to Variety and Digital Music News. A Copyright Now summary of the filing says the complaint seeks statutory copyright damages of up to $150,000 per work, totaling $40.35 million for 269 works, plus $672,500 and $6.725 million under anti-circumvention and copyright management information claims. Eminem is not a party, Variety reported.

“Suno has mechanically encoded itself with artists’ identities, hard-work, creativity, and time, and harnessed them all for a consistent conveyor belt of cold hard cash,” the Presley complaint says. The same attorneys, including Richard Busch, represent both sets of plaintiffs, Variety reported.

“Suno exists to help people create new, original music, not to trade on anyone’s name or likeness, and we prohibit any unauthorized use of an artist’s work,” Suno spokesperson Cat McCormack told The Verge. The company said it does not allow prompts for specific artists’ names and songs, works with third-party providers to screen uploads and lyrics, and will keep adding safeguards.

The suits add to cases against Suno from Universal Music Group, Sony Music and others, as well as a proposed class action led by Jason Isbell, whose allegations Suno has denied, Variety reported. The Eight Mile complaint alleges Suno used the stream-ripping tools YT-DL and YT-DLP; Suno previously acknowledged in court using YT-DLP to obtain YouTube audio for training. Presley rights holders also sued Anthropic in October over 274 songs.

Elvis Presley rights holders and Eminem’s publisher sue Suno, federal court filings show

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