In dueling motions in limine filed this week in the Southern District of New York before Judge Arun Subramanian, Live Nation and government prosecutors are battling over two potentially explosive categories of evidence: the company’s massive payments to artists and its 2018 acquisition of Songkick.

At stake is not just evidentiary housekeeping — but the narrative framework of the entire case.

Live Nation’s March 2 filing asks the court to exclude any suggestion that the company harmed competition by “overpaying” artists to secure tours. The next day, the DOJ and coalition of state attorneys general fired back, accusing the company of trying to hide critical context from the jury.

The dispute centers on how Live Nation’s role as a promoter works. As CEO Michael Rapino testified in February, promoters compete intensely by offering artists large upfront guarantees and revenue splits. The more competitive the bidding, the higher those guarantees climb.

Live Nation argues that paying artists more is the very definition of procompetitive behavior, arguing that aggressive bidding is lawful unless it qualifies as predatory pricing — meaning low cost pricing that make recoupment impossible.

Allowing prosecutors to imply that Live Nation’s artist guarantees were anticompetitive, the company argues, would effectively introduce a new “predatory bidding” claim on the eve of trial — something courts routinely prohibit.

But the DOJ says Live Nation is mischaracterizing the issue.

In its opposition brief, the government insists it does not intend to argue that bidding up artist guarantees is illegal. Instead, it says those payments are essential to help jurors understand how Live Nation’s vertically integrated flywheel model works — and how dominance in one segment fuels power in another.

The government’s argument hinges on three themes:

1. Relationships with Artists. Promoters “absorb financial risk” by making large lump-sum guarantees, the court previously noted at summary judgment. The jury needs to understand how those guarantees function in the live ecosystem.

2. Barriers to Entry. Only well-capitalized companies can shoulder the risk of promoting stadium and amphitheater tours. The DOJ argues that Live Nation’s ability to fund massive guarantees — potentially supported by profits from ticketing and other business segments — reinforces its dominance at major venues.

3. Interconnected Business Segments. Live Nation has already highlighted its relatively modest operating margins in its opening statement. The government says it must be allowed to explain how those margins are calculated — including the role of artist payments — and how capital flows across the company’s businesses.

Live Nation says high guarantees equal competition. The DOJ says they illustrate structural power.

Songkick, originally known as CrowdSurge, operated in the artist presale and fan-club ticketing space. It did not bid for exclusive venue ticketing contracts but instead worked with artists to sell tickets directly to fans.

Live Nation’s filing argues the acquisition was not anticompetitive, but that the transaction occurred as part of a settlement resolving litigation between the companies. Introducing the purchase to the jury, Live Nation says, would create a distracting “trial within a trial” and potentially violate Federal Rules of Evidence, which limits the use of settlement evidence in a trial.

Live Nation also argues that Songkick operated outside the traditional ticketing market and that the court overseeing the Songkick lawsuit defined that business as part of the narrower “artist presale ticketing services” market.

The DOJ disagrees with Live Nation’s assessment.

Prosecutors argue that acquisitions of “nascent or adjacent threats” are classic examples of monopolization conduct. They cite cases including United States v. Grinnell Corp. and Standard Oil Co. v. United States to underscore that serial acquisitions can help “perfect monopoly power.”

Critically, the government says it want to introduce evidence of Live Nation’s internal communications during the Songkick litigation — including communication between employees who were prosecuted for illegally hacking into Songkick — and the competitive impact on the market that came with eliminating Songkick as an independent player.

If Live Nation succeeds, the jury may never hear detailed evidence about how artist guarantees function as strategic leverage — nor about internal discussions surrounding the elimination of potential competitive threats.

If the DOJ prevails, jurors could see a fuller portrait of how Live Nation’s concert promotion muscle, ticketing dominance and acquisition strategy intertwine.

The evidentiary fight also reflects a deeper philosophical divide. Live Nation leans heavily on the belief that price competition — even aggressive price competition — is presumptively good for markets. The government advances a more modern theory: that dominance can be reinforced not just through pricing, but through ecosystem control and strategic consolidation.

Judge Subramanian’s rulings on these motions could significantly shape what jurors understand about Live Nation’s business model — and whether the company’s scale represents vigorous competition or unlawful maintenance of monopoly power.

As the trial enters its next phase, the battle over narrative control is just beginning.