Label: Late DEATH Mainman's Family Was Ordered To Hand Over CONTROL DENIED Master Tapes

Guido Heijnens, owner of the now-defunct Dutch record label Hammerheart Records (which has since been "resurrected" under the Karmageddon Media banner),has issued the following statement regarding the status of the unfinished recordings originally slated to appear on the sophomore CONTROL DENIED album (the band formed by the late DEATH mainman Chuck Schuldiner):

"Judgement by default was done on June 22nd 2005. The Schuldiner family have been ordered to hand over all the master tapes for the new CONTROL DENIED album. Failing to do so the Schuldiner family will have to pay a penalty of $**** for each day up to a maximum of $******. The Schuldiner family have also been ordered to repay $***** plus statory interest and legal costs.

"Finally, the Schuldiner family has been ordered to carry out rectification by publishing on the Internet site the text specified in the judgment, failing to do so will lead to a penalty of $**** for each day up to a maximum of $******.

"All $-related numbers have been left out since these are business related matters.

"For anyone who does not understand what this means: Hammerheart Records B.V. have done nothing wrong and the court has ruled in all matters/subjects in their favour. The family has to pay all costs, rectify the things said on www.emptywords.org, pay back all costs plus interest and hand over the master tapes for the album!!!

"So to all the fans out there, let's see if Hammerheart Records finally will get this album to release it, or if the family remains stubborn and keeps on lying to the fans…"

As previously reported, Chuck — who passed away in December 2001 after a battle with pontine glioma, a rare type of brain tumor — began work on the album (tentatively titled "When Machine and Man Collide") in 2001 but never managed to complete the effort before his health quickly deteriorated in the months leading up to his tragic death. The remaining members of the group — bassist Steve DiGiorgio, vocalist Tim Aymar, guitarist Shannon Hamm, and drummer Richard Christy — subsequently announced their desire to complete the CD and release it in Chuck's memory, but legal hassles between Schuldiner's family and Hammerheart Records (to whom Chuck was signed at the time of his death) put the entire project on hold (Karmageddon Media — formerly Hammerheart Records — have since issued various incomplete demo recordings as two separate low-quality albums, "Zero Tolerance" and "Zero Tolerance II").

Jane Schuldiner, mother of late DEATH/CONTROL DENIED frontman Chuck Schuldiner, had previously stated about the unfinished recordings: "[Chuck's]last masterpiece deserves more than to be released as unfinished bits of rehearsal room recordings on CD, or to be grabbed for free on the Internet. It deserves to be finished by the rest of the band and to be released on a full-length album, titled: 'When Machine and Man Collide'."