Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams Lose Copyright Lawsuit

[chamber-music]

it was kinda similar but I'm not really happy about the result. I write songs and sometimes I get scared if my songs might be similar to other songs.

I think it is easy for songs to sound similar. The chances of someone coming up with a melody or beat like any of the millions of songs already in existence is highly likely. There is only a certain amount of chord changes, piano sequences, ect you can formulate.

The issue is if a musician knowingly rips off another songwriter.

 

[Warhammer]

The fall of Robin Thicke. 2014 sucked for him.

I will say this. The millions of people that claimed that this song is about rape are idiotic to the point where condescension is warranted. Are you not listening to the damn lyrics? Read them instead of reiterating what a misinformed person says the song is about. It's about sex. And the worst part is that the radio stations that were playing this song play worse songs throughout the day. That is hypocritical.

 

[Godzilla2000]

It sounds to me like a Date Rape song. *shrug*

 

[terry78]

Do you know how many songs about love sound rapey? Too many to count.

 

[Godzilla2000]

Yes, which is why I'm not that crazy about "love" songs.

 

[The Batman]

I feel like a lot of people just looked at/heard a line or two from the song and decided it was a rape anthem.

 

[MadVillainy]

I feel like a lot of people just looked at/heard a line or two from the song and decided it was a rape anthem.

pretty much

 

[DA_Champion]

Clay Aiken's invisible is a worse song in terms of rapey lyrics.

I wish I could be a fly on your wall

...

If I was invisible
Then I could just watch you in your room

 

[jmc]

Regardless of how you feel about this song or the artist this ruling could have significant repercussions for music, and that's not a good thing.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

Regardless of how you feel about this song or the artist this ruling could have significant repercussions for music, and that's not a good thing.

Yeah, you can't be obvious when you steal melodies from another artist.

And why is this case any different than when Vanilla Ice had to pay Queen for "Ice, Ice, Baby"?

 

[Frodo]

Regardless of how you feel about this song or the artist this ruling could have significant repercussions for music, and that's not a good thing.

Well I know that Uptown Funk certainly has a James Brown feel , Young Girls sounds very much like Aerosmith's Jaded, Birthday by Katy Perry sounds like Prince , and Some Nights by Fun sounds like Simon and Garfunkel's Cecilia and those are just off the top of my head.

Everybody is influenced by everyone else, and yes lots of songs are influenced by other songs . Its no secret. The copyright standard use to be if you stole the melody but if I'm to understand this ruling, the precedence is now if it has the same "artistic feel of a particular artist or era". That's a pretty broad quishie standard , and if you had this standard way back in the Rock and Roll era, The Beatles, Elvis, Sinatra , Hank Williams, and probably Marvin Gaye himself, would get the crap sued out of of them because their singing style, groove, or feel of a song would be too reminiscent of some other artists they were influenced by.

Now in the case of Under Pressure and Ice Baby, that was literally the same riff that Vanilla Ice stole without paying. That's clearly copyright infringement.
Under this new standard, one has to wonder if the songs even have to sound that much alike anymore for someone to sue if the two songs have the same spirit or are have the same artistic feel to them. The old standard was much more narrow but this new standard blurs the lines, pardon the pun.

 

[The Batman]

^ Great Post.

Its hard enough being a musician in this day and age, now if your song even vaguely sounds like something else, you can get sued. I thought that whole Sam Smith/Tom Petty thing was kinda silly too.

 

[Lily Adler]

Bruno Mars's sounds like multiple other artists. I think that is his intent and I like it when it works. The noticeable exception is Gorilla which sounds like a rejected Prince song, but not a good one like Nothing Compares 2 U apparently is.

 

[Shinizokonai]

Bruno Mars's sounds like multiple other artists. I think that is his intent and I like it when it works. The noticeable exception is Gorilla which sounds like a rejected Prince song, but not a good one like Nothing Compares 2 U apparently is.

I liked Bruno a lot when he was releasing songs like 'Just The Way You Are' and 'Grenade'. I think he's an amazing performer, but I'm not sure how I feel about his eagerness to embrace the whole 'throwback' sound as of Unorthodox Jukebox.

As for the Thicke and Pharrell situation, this is not the first time that Thicke style-jacks Marvin Gaye:

[YT]IjKrl8KRuHQ[/YT]

The difference is that he credited Gaye in the album's liner notes for that song. Interestingly enough, that same album features a track that's pretty much a lyrical cover of 'Mahogany' by Eric B. and Rakim, yet they are not credited; just the Al Green sample that Thicke uses on it.