Seal loses court appeal over payments

LONDON - Seal lost his bid Wednesday to overturn a British court ruling ordering the Grammy-winning singer to pay his ex-manager commissions on earnings from his first two albums.

Court of Appeal Judge Roger Toulson dismissed Seal's challenge to a High Court ruling in June that his former manager John Wadlow was entitled to unpaid commissions due under a 1995 agreement.

Both of the albums in question were recorded before that date. In June, the court had ordered Seal to make an interim payment of $922,000.

The appeal court cited an earlier management agreement and the 1995 settlement signed by Seal, whose real name is Henry Olusegun Adeola Samuel, when he severed his links with Wadlow.

Seal, 44, argued both agreements weren't valid because his former manager had used "undue influence."

Toulson said the terms agreed on in the settlement were "not unreasonable or oppressive" from Seal's point of view.

The court heard how a then-undiscovered 24-year-old Seal met Wadlow, who was a partner in a recording studio business known as Beethoven Street Studios, in 1987.

Their relationship continued until the March 1995 agreement, by which time Seal was an international star.

He released his first album in May 1991 and his second in May 1994; both reached No. 1 on British album charts.

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