CHARLESTON – The defendants in a civil lawsuit that focuses on a soured business relationship that includes the musician behind “Rich Men North of Richmond” have filed an answer and counterclaim.
John D. Price and Price Hill Records LLC doing business as Appalachia Untold also filed a motion for preliminary injunction November 27. RadioWV LLC filed its complaint in October month in Kanawha Circuit Court. Draven A. Riffe is the sole member of RadioWV.
The defendants deny the allegations made in Riffe’s original complaint. In the counterclaim, Price says he and Riffe entered into a contract on June 6, 2023, to resolve their prior dispute that included granting Riffe exclusive right, title and ownership of RadioWV. Price says the deal meant he would receive 45 percent of all advertising revenue raised by the direct monetization of RadioWV social media ads.
Webb
“This complaint is nothing but a smokescreen and pretext for not paying Price his entitled royalties,” the counterclaim states, adding Riffe “realized he struck a bad bargain” when substantial revenue started flowing in.
“This complaint is nothing more than an abuse of process in an attempt to get the parties back to the bargaining table,” the counterclaim states. “Price has not violated any terms with the agreement. Riffe is simply angry that he struck a bad deal and is jealous of Price’s bargain and of Price’s success.”
The counterclaim says RadioWV had been “exceptionally successful” with videos gaining hundreds of thousands to millions of views, including singer Oliver Anthony’s “Rich Men.” It has received approximately 80 million views on YouTube and was the top song on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for two weeks.
The counterclaim says that video earned Price about $156,000 in August alone.
“It’s unfortunate the plaintiff dragged Oliver Anthony’s name into the complaint,” attorney Rusty Webb, who is representing Price, told The West Virginia Record. “He has absolutely nothing to do with this action.”
According to the original complaint, Riffe started a men’s grooming products company in 2016 called Burly Boy. In 2018, he says he began an online sponsorship-marketing effort to create video for West Virginia musicians. He decided to create YouTube, Instagram and Facebook pages for this project he called radiowv.
In 2019, Riffe says he and his Burly Boy business partner established RadioAppalachia LLC and claimed the tradenames radiowv and AppalachiaRadio. The complaint says Price never was a member of RadioAppalachia.
But Riffe did enter into an agreement with Price where they worked together and separately to record videos under the radiowv banner, edit them and post them on the radiowv social media pages. Soon, Riffe says he severed the arrangement with his Burly Boy partner, who retained the Burly Boy business operations while Riffe took sole control of radiowv.
Riffe says he came to an agreement with Price to work together producing music videos and each would be compensated on a 50-50 basis of all advertising revenues. Eventually, Riffe says radiowv began seeing “tremendous success” with some videos gaining hundreds of thousands to millions of views and launching several new music careers, including Anthony. Riffe is Anthony’ co-manager.
The original complaint says the video for Anthony’s “Rich Men” song “was recorded and produced solely by Riffe on August 8, 2023. But that was after Riffe says Price took action in April 2023 to deny Riffe access to radiowv by changing the passwords to radiowv’s social media and email accounts that were created by Riffe, according to the complaint. He says Price also removed Riffe’s credential from the accounts “effectively locking Riffe out of those accounts.”
On May 4, Riffe filed a complaint for preliminary injunctive and other relief against Price in Kanawha Circuit Court alleging breach of contract, breach of duty, conversion, defamation, slander of title, tortious interference and unjust enrichment. There was a mediation on June 6, and the sides reached a settlement agreement. As part of that agreement, Price, Riffe and RadioWV LLC agreed to dissolve their general partnership in radiowv.
In addition to other financial issues, the agreement also said RadioWV LLC is solely owned by Riffe, and it says Price would deliver all physical assets such as microphones, SD cards, digital storage devices, video and audio clips purchased by Riffe for the partnership. It also said the partiers would not disparage each other.
But Riffe says Price created Appalachia Untold social media profiles to compete against radiowv. A few days before the mediation, Riffe says Price shared and promoted his new competing business on radiowv’s social media accounts.
The lawsuit also mentions an agreement with 16-year-old singer Jake Kohn that Price allegedly violated when he posted radiowv’s video of him singing an original song on the Appalachia Untold social media pages. It has more than 8 million views on those social media pages.
Riffe says he had “every intention” of creating a production-worthy video for Kohn’s song titled “Dreams” when the time was best for both radiowv and Kohn. He expected to do so in early fall to give radiowv “another likely surge after the successes of ‘Rich Men North of Richmond’” and would have helped put Kohn in a position to be radiowv’s next “star.”
In addition to retaining and posting the Kohn video, Riffe claims Price also has breached the settlement agreement by discussing and misstating the terms of the agreement with others.
Riffe, through RadioWV, accuses the defendants of breach of contract, unjust enrichment, conversion, tortious interference and slander. He seeks expectancy damages for the amount of advertising revenue and royalties Riffe and RadioWV would have gained had Price not breached the settlement agreement as well as expectancy damages for the value of the followers, views and engagement RadioWV would have gained.
He also seeks compensatory, consequential and punitive damages as well as attorney fees, court costs and other relief.
In the counterclaim, Price accuses the plaintiffs of breach of contract, breach of duty, conversion, defamation, slander of title, tortious interference, unjust enrichment, breach of trust and breach of fiduciary duty. He seeks the 45 percent of ad revenue he says he’s due as well as other compensatory and consequential damages, punitive damages, a preliminary and permanent injunction ordering Riffe to stop all acts of interference and similar acts, pre- and post-judgment interests, attorney fees, court costs and other relief.
The plaintiffs are being represented by Jonathon Stanley, Kent George and Mary Williams of Robinson & McElwee in Charleston. The defendants are being represented by Webb of The Webb Law Centre in Charleston. The case has been assigned to Circuit Judge Carrie Webster.
Kanawha Circuit Court case number 23-C-916
