A federal judge says the Justice Department can move ahead with a key allegation in its antitrust case against Live Nation: That the company illegally forces artists to use its promotion services if they want to perform in its massive network of amphitheaters.
In a written ruling issued Friday (March 14), Judge Arun Subramanian denied Live Nation’s request to dismiss an accusation that the concert giant illegally required artists to buy one service if they wanted to purchase another one — known in antitrust parlance as “tying.”
Ahead of the ruling, attorneys for Live Nation had argued that it was merely refusing to let rival concert promoters rent its venues, something that’s fair game under longstanding legal precedents. But the judge wrote in his ruling that the DOJ’s accusations were clearly focused on artists, not competing firms.
“The complaint explains that due to Live Nation’s monopoly power in the large-amphitheater market, artists are effectively locked into using Live Nation as the promoter for a tour that stops at large amphitheaters,” the judge wrote, before adding later: “These allegations aren’t just about a refusal to deal with rival promoters. They are about the coercion of artists.”
The decision was not on the final merits of the DOJ’s case; the feds must still provide factual evidence to prove that Live Nation actually coerced artists. But at the earliest stage of the case, when courts must assume allegations are true, Judge Subramanian ruled that the DOJ had done enough to move ahead.
The DOJ and dozens of states filed the sweeping antitrust lawsuit in May, aimed at breaking up Live Nation and Ticketmaster over accusations that they form an illegal monopoly over the live music industry. The feds alleged Live Nation runs an illegal “flywheel” — reaping revenue from ticket buyers, using that money to sign artists, then leveraging that repertoire to lock venues into exclusive ticketing contracts that yield ever more revenue.
Among other accusations, the government argued that Live Nation was exploiting its massive market share in amphitheaters — allegedly 40 of the top 50 such venues in the country – to force artists to use its concert promotion services.
“Live Nation has a longstanding policy going back more than a decade of preventing artists who prefer and choose third-party promoters from using its venues,” the DOJ wrote in its complaint. “In other words, if an artist wants to use a Live Nation venue as part of a tour, he or she almost always must contract with Live Nation as the tour’s concert promoter.”
Not so, argued attorneys for Live Nation. In its own court filings, the company said that it merely refuses to rent out its portfolio of amphitheaters to the competing concert promotion companies that artists have hired — and that it is “settled law” under federal antitrust statutes that a company has “no duty to aid its competitors.”
In Friday’s decision, Judge Subramanian said that argument could succeed at trial, but that the DOJ’s basic legal theory was sound enough to survive for now: “The facts may ultimately show that the tying claim here is nothing more than a refusal-to-deal claim,” the judge wrote. “But at this stage, the court’s role is to determine whether the complaint states a plausible tying claim, and it does.”
Live Nation did not immediately return a request for comment. A trial is tentatively scheduled for March 2026.