Gossip Mogul Perez Hilton Blocks SonyBMG Artists

Celebrity blogger Perez Hilton has vowed to stop reporting on artists signed to SonyBMG after the record label issued a lawsuit against the gossip website.

Writing on his website, Hilton, whose real name is Mario Lavandeira, said that artists such as Justin Timberlake, Adele and The Gossip were now considered “dead to us”.

“These are some of our favourite musicians,” he said.

“It really, truly pains us not to talk about them. But, it is something we have to do!”

SonyBMG filed a lawsuit against the blogger last October after it emerged that a series of songs the website had posted were by Britney Spears.

Zomba, a subdivision of SonyBMG who own the rights to Spears’ recordings, said Lavandeira had illegally obtained and posted the recordings.

However, Lavandeira claims the material was posted “not knowing if it was or wasn't an authentic Spears song”.

On his website today, he also noted how the songs had been posted by other websites “yet Perez Hilton is the only entity being sued by SonyBMG.”