Lawmakers Revive Music-Contract Bill

Legislators turned to a parliamentary maneuver to resuscitate a bill that seeks to stop California’s $41-billion recording industry from locking singers into contracts for long stretches of their careers.

The Senate Judiciary Committee converted the bill, already three weeks past its legislative deadline to reach the Senate floor or die, into a special legislation device called a “spot” bill. The procedure keeps the bill’s idea alive while the record industry and its biggest artists try to resolve an issue that’s divided them for months.