Kid Rock’s career always manages to baffle, drudging up seemingly endless questions and concerns. Call us haters, but it’s hard to understand the genre-bending trajectory of his career from rap rock to pop country, both of which “genres” this world may have been better off without. Beyond the music, it’s difficult to grasp how a guy from northern Michigan could sell so much music and merchandise about the American South without being labeled a total wannabe/fraud.
Regardless, we can’t deny his ability to remain relatively popular over the years on the wings of the odd pop single, offensive comment or publicity stunt (such as the time he said he was going to run for Senate and sold a ton of related merchandise before claiming that it was all a marketing campaign for his upcoming album, Sweet Southern Sugar). Kid Rock is a savvy businessman and popular performer, but is his live concert good enough to earn the accolade of “Greatest Show on Earth?”
Feld Entertainment, the parent company of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, certainly didn’t think so, filing suit against Kid Rock and Live Nation for the use of their trademarked title for the famed circus. Kid Rock and Live Nation are reportedly being accused of unfair competition, trademark dilution and infringement, injury to business reputation and unjust enrichment. Despite Kid Rock’s patent rebel attitude, it seems the musician has decided that his chances of winning were slim, instead renaming his upcoming tour the American Rock ‘n’ Roll Tour 2018.
In the wake of this concession, it appears that Feld Entertainment is still eager to take the rocker to court in Florida, seeking discontinued use of the name, unspecified damages and the forfeiture of all monies gained via the sale of tour-related merchandise that bore the slogan in question.
If this case does end up going to court, Kid Rock’s audaciousness could be facing a serious test. If only he had settled for Second Greatest Show on Earth…
In the meantime, we’ll be mourning all the glorious merchandise that has now been lost to the world. While we can’t include a link to Kid Rock’s online merchandise store due to its NSFW nature, we will say that it reflects much of his music: crude, mostly tasteless and overall rather questionable.
