Amazon Music and DistroKid Hit with Lawsuit Over Unpaid Royalties and Allegations of Shadowbanning

Marc Mysterio is an award-winning musician and multi-faceted celebrity who was tapped by IBA Boxing to compete for its vacant championship vs. Jake Paul and collaborated with a who’s-who–according to Billboard–including: Flo Rida, Crash Test Dummies, David Guetta, Avicii, Samantha Fox, and Netflix’ Trailer Park Boys.

As a philanthropist, Marc has supported the One Fund Boston in support of terrorist victims(marathon), and WBC Cares, the charity arm of WBC Boxing.

As a celebrity, he’s covered by: TMZ, Billboard, BBC, ESPN, Irish Star, CBS, Daily Mail (UK), Fox News, and followed on X by NY Post Page 6 and Radar Online.

From September 1st 2023-August 31st, 2024, Marc received 80,000,000+ streams on Amazon Music resulting in US Billboard Hot Dance/Electronic Chart (“The Dancefloor”) and scores of Amazon Top Songs Chart appearances.

However, now Marc is suing Amazon and DistroKid alleging that he wasn’t properly compensated for these streams and Fans have been receiving a “streaming error” since September 10th, 2024 when attempting to stream his music and/or request it via Alexa due to “Shadow-Banning.”

Shadow-Banning is the practice of blocking/partially blocking live content so that the ban is not readily apparent to the artist.

“We filed this lawsuit to make sure that Marc Mysterio gets the fruits of his labor as one of the top performers on Amazon Music in 2024, and injunctive relief to end the shadow-ban. Shadow-banning successful artists is an unfair tactic and it allows Amazon, by throttling streams of a song, to interfere with Amazon/Billboard Charts thereby tortiously manipulating the music-business at the expense of creators–IT MUST END!” notes Marc’s Attorney, Michael H. Joseph of Law Office of Michael H. Joseph, PLLC of New York who filed the case in US District Court For The Southern District of New York (Case No. 1:25-cv-01705).

Furthermore, the shadowban has also extended to music distributed–to Amazon–by UnitedMasters according to an email from UnitedMasters Support, with VP of Music, David Melhado, in cc:
“I am currently in the US, and I’m having the same issue with streaming your music. I’ve followed up with Amazon a few times, and am still not hearing back. I’m touching base with our higher-ups to see if we have any further operational contacts we can reach out to.”

Marc Mysterio posted screenshot evidence in support of his claims to his X Account @marc_mysterio directly from his Amazon Music Artists’ Account, for media, including: 1,250,000+ fans/followers, 80,000,000+ streams 15,000,000 unique listeners in 2024, 45,000 Alexa requests in August, Amazon and Billboard Chartings and more.

“DistroKid was paid to distribute Marc’s music and remit 100% of royalties received, whilst Amazon charged Marc’s Fans to stream his music. Defendants need to account royalties due, as well as compensate future losses proximated from the shadow-ban. These losses are already in the ‘millions’ and will increase by trial date.” Joseph concludes.