A band called Heaven 17, which is a popular band from Great Britain decided to decline an offer from Rockstar Games which wanted to buy the rights to use a music track entitled “Temptation” for the upcoming Grand Theft Auto 6 for $7,500.
To give you an idea, Martyn Ware, the band’s co-founder, had no mercy when he retorted to the review; in fact, he wrote it on X (formerly Twitter).
The response? A quicker retort ‘Go f**k yourself. ’ Today the story has grown into an international scandal as to whether the offer was sane or if the band was right to refuse to bow down to pressure.
Read: Every GTA VI Leak and Rumors to Date
Rockstar Games Gets a “Go F**k Yourself” from Heaven 17 for $7,500 GTA 6 Offer
In the same work, the viewer is offered a creation of Rockstar, the company that became famous for GTA: O’Hara, Heaven 17.
And it was Rockstar Games – the creators of video games of the Grand Theft Auto series – who contacted Heaven 17 with an offer to license their hit “Temptation” for the GTA 6.
The flip side for the band would be that in exchange, they were paid a $7,500 one-off fee for owning all the rights to the usage of this song in this game without even the possibility of paying any royalties further to Rockstar Games.
For a band like Heaven 17 and an artist being a part of such an essential generation of the 1980s, this honestly sounded quite low.
Its founder Martyn Ware has been rather matter-of-fact about it. After that, he proceeded to X to refer to the offer as an outrage.
Image Credits: GTAThe message came across loud and clear: Heaven 17 was not going to let their song go for what they felt was a derisory amount.
I was recently contacted by my publishers on behalf of Rockstar Games re the possibility of using Temptation on the new Grand Theft Auto 6
Naturally excited about the immense wealth that was about to head my way, I scrolled to the bottom of the email re the offer…
— Martyn Ware 🦉 (@martynware) September 7, 2024
This candid decline immediately generated lots of opinions across the internet. Some fans and industry experts see this as a good chance for the band’s promotion, especially for young people who probably never heard any songs from them.
Indeed, Grand Theft Auto is one of the most successful video game series of all time and, as everybody knows, the soundtracks are often very ‘killer’.
However, the distortion was soon defended by almost every artist that was in the band. This was one of the many issues that many musicians have in claiming or receiving for their work, as reflected in Heaven 17’s case.
Thus, proposing to record a song with the potential to become hit statuses for a one-time fee without royalties sent a familiar note to the listeners.
Nevertheless, it is Rockstar Games that has a tradition of buying out exclusively the best hits of Michael Jackson and Dr. Dre for including their songs in its previous games.
Why should Heaven 17 accept anything less, especially when the Indian airwaves were far from saturated at the time?
This brings me to the frustration of Martyn Ware well, Heaven 17 mightily helped shape the sound of an era and for them, thirty-five hundred US dollars for one of their most ubiquitous songs was a joke, a slap on the face.
Based on the public behavior Works rejected Rockstar’s offer stating that it wasn’t a money issue but a concern when musicians are rigged.
A statement on its own it was bold but a rejection nonetheless, this shows that just because one is an entertainment titan does not give license to try and undersell artists. Heaven 17 wasn’t going to put up with it, and maybe Rockstar was so accustomed to getting its way.
The Bigger Picture
Today many musicians are struggling with little offers from great companies and defending their rights, and their material which has become particularly popular.
As for now, it can be only a question of whether the Rockstar decided to come back with a higher offer or took the possibility of choosing another song for the GTA 6 soundtrack.
But one thing is sure: What Heaven 17 said no to won’t easily be forgotten and may very well inspire other performers to seek a better arrangement regarding their product.
The band’s decision to reject Rockstar Games offer may have been deemed by some as peculiar but it does appear that Heaven 17 is sticking to their guns when it comes to setting a price tag on their work.
This whole furor began when Martyn Ware posted his incendiary response, and it has raised many bigger questions about how artists should properly be remunerated by cheap outfits with far more extensive enterprise.
It will indeed be quite thrilling to watch out whether Rockstar Games attempts at. with other other more popular artists as it completes the much-awaited Grand Theft Auto 6 renditions.
About the Author(153 Articles Published)
Jeeva Shanmugam is a highly skilled content writer with expertise in writing articles, blogs, and other forms of content on various Esports-related topics.
