FKA twigs, born Tahliah Barnett, has filed a lawsuit against the ’90s alt-pop band the Twigs, claiming that the duo has issued numerous cease-and-desist letters over the trademark connected to her stage name. Barnett has requested a jury trial to address the rights to use and registration of the FKA Twigs trademark. Pitchfork has reached out to representatives for both artists for comment.
In her lawsuit, Barnett claims the twin sisters behind the Twigs, Laura Good and Linda Good, have known about her stage name since 2013 and exchanged messages about the “likelihood of confusion between her stage name and their band’s name.” Back then, Barnett performed under the name the Twigs and reportedly offered the duo $15,000 to allow their music projects to “co-exist” without resorting to purchasing the name from the duo. “Laura and Linda declined and stressed that they did not consent to this proposed co-existence,” reads the lawsuit. The duo sued Barnett in 2014 and, in response, she officially changed her moniker to FKA twigs moving forward — a name change that they believed wasn’t different enough to avoid mixups.
In May 2024, the Twigs allegedly tried to “weaponize these barred and unmeritorious trademark claims” by issuing cease-and-desist letters to Barnett “threatening litigation, including threats to enjoin Barnett’s use of her mark, in order to disrupt Barnett’s decade-long, uninterrupted use of the FKA twigs mark for Defendants’ own gain,” reads Barnett’s lawsuit. The Twigs allegedly “have threatened to seek an injunction preventing Barnett from using her stage name, demanded a significant seven-figure payout to release any alleged claims against Barnett.”
In pushing back on this, Barnett is asking for the rights to use and register the FKA twigs trademark, as to be decided in a jury trial. Among the evidence provided in her lawsuit to justify a case, the Grammy-winning Barnett points out that the Twigs, who formed in 1994, have “simply disappeared” after their correspondence over a decade ago.
Barnett also notes that, when filing the legal documents, FKA twigs had 3.2 million monthly Spotify listeners and over 300 million YouTube views, while the Twigs “have 67 subscribers and 19,332 views on YouTube, 705 followers on Instagram, and 25 monthly listeners on Spotify” — proof, in her words, that “the parties operate in entirely different commercial ecosystems” and could not be confused for one another.
This past November, FKA twigs released EUSEXUA Afterglow, a new album paired with a reimagined version of her third studio album, EUSEXUA. The original version of that LP earned Barnett her first-ever Grammy Award as FKA twigs last month. “I know to a lot of people I may be new, but I’ve actually been doing this a really long time,” she said during her acceptance speech. “To any artist: Don’t give up, follow your vision, do you, because that’s what’s going to make the world fall in love with your art.”
Read about Eusexua at No. 42 in The 50 Best Albums of 2025.
