EMI Group has been accused of hypocrisy and copyright infringement after illegally putting a band's music online.

Robert Fripp, front man and founder of seventies band King Crimson, claimed on his blog that EMI had made the band's music available for download, despite not owning download rights to any of the tracks.

"It is a little rich to punish punters for illegal downloads of EMI copyright material when EMI is itself guilty of copyright violation," Fripp wrote.

"Many months ago the EMI lawyer (the one who also said s**t happens! get over it) effectively told us: 'I've done my best'. This isn't good enough when making publicly available the copyright material of others."

Fripp explained that the band split with EMI because the company would not pay enough for download rights for King Crimson's music. The band is now suing for back payment for the online sales.