\n\tBeyonc\u00e9<\/a>\u2019s label and management company, Parkwood Entertainment, has defeated a copyright lawsuit over the EDM sample that opens her hit 2022 Renaissance<\/em> track \u201cAlien Superstar.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tA Friday (June 26) court ruling, first obtained and reported by Billboard<\/em>, dismisses the lawsuit brought against Parkwood<\/a> last summer by a company claiming to own the 1998 John Holiday song \u201cMoonraker.\u201d A sample of that track serves as the introduction to \u201cAlien Superstar\u201d: \u201cPlease do not be alarmed, remain calm\/ Do not attempt to leave the dancefloor\/ The DJ booth is conducting a troubleshoot of the entire system.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\tRelated\t\t<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p><\/div>\n \t\t\t<\/a>\n\t<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n\tParkwood cleared this sample from Holiday; the house musician is listed in the lengthy Renaissance<\/em> credits<\/a> and was paid $10,000 plus 0.5% of the royalties from \u201cAlien Superstar,\u201d which hit No. 19 on the Billboard Hot 100. But in the July 2025 lawsuit, Florida-based Hirose Enterprises LLC alleged that it is actually the owner of the \u201cMoonraker\u201d copyrights and thus should have been part of that licensing process.<\/p>\n \n\tHirose Enterprises LLC is owned by Shuji Hirose<\/strong>, the co-founder of now-defunct indie label Soundmen on Wax. The lawsuit claims Soundmen on Wax bought the \u201cMoonraker\u201d copyrights in 1998. Parkwood argued in response that there\u2019s no paperwork documenting that purported transfer of rights, and thus it properly cleared<\/a> the \u201cAlien Superstar\u201d sample from Holiday directly.<\/p>\n \n\tJudge Mark C. Scarsi did not need to address those arguments in order to dismiss the lawsuit on Friday, however. That\u2019s because it turns out Hirose Enterprises was not actually formed until a week after the lawsuit was filed \u2014 a major legal defect that bars it from suing in the first place.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cPlease do not be alarmed, remain calm: like the DJ booth referenced in the works at issue, this district judge must conduct a troubleshoot test of the entire system \u2014 that is, a jurisdictional inquiry \u2014 before reaching any of the parties\u2019 merits arguments,\u201d wrote the judge, quoting the \u201cMoonraker\u201d lyrics. \u201cPlaintiff had no legal existence at the time it brought suit, so it cannot have held a stake in the outcome of the litigation at the time it filed the complaint.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tJudge Scarsi thus threw out the entire case against Parkwood, as well as Sony Music Entertainment, Sony Music Publishing and Warner Chappell. Beyonc\u00e9 herself was not targeted in the lawsuit.<\/p>\n \n\tReps for the various litigants did not immediately return requests for comment on Monday (June 29). Hirose Enterprises has the right to appeal Friday\u2019s dismissal ruling if it wants another chance at pursuing the copyright claims.<\/p>\n\n
![\"Billboard](\"https:\/\/i.imgur.com\/2HpFicp.png\")