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Flame sues Katy Perry for copyright infringement and is awarded $2.7m

Started by Johnny Yesno, August 04, 2019, 08:13:16 PM

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Quote from: NoSleep on August 06, 2019, 10:37:44 AM
Can't wait to see somebody try and copyright "Yes, yes y'all, to the beat y'all." or "I love you."

I was thinking of the intro to O Superman or that John Cage silent track to take it to extremes.

NoSleep

Schaeffer/Henry, Stockhausen or maybe even Terry Riley might be able to pre-empt even Laurie Anderson. How dare she copy the idea of a tape loop with a voice on it.

I'm sure you don't have to look too far to find a hit song with an "ah ah ah ah" in the backing somewhere. Transpose it to the right key and bingo.

Quote from: NoSleep on August 06, 2019, 10:37:44 AM
Can't wait to see somebody try and copyright "Yes, yes y'all, to the beat y'all." or "I love you."
"Oh Yeah!"

rue the polywhirl

It's the motif of the song which is the offending bit. The motifs of the two songs are essentially the same. Much like the case with Vanilla Ice and Queen.

NoSleep

No... Vanilla Ice sampled Queen. They own that recording of themselves.

olliebean

Quote from: NoSleep on August 06, 2019, 09:17:55 AM
If you're going to sue somebody, for copping elements of a song/production you have created, the burden of proof is for you to show how you invented those elements from nothing; that nobody had ever heard such things in a song before.

Should be, but evidently isn't.

Pauline Walnuts

Quote from: NoSleep on August 06, 2019, 11:26:33 AM
No... Vanilla Ice sampled Queen. They own that recording of themselves.

But Queen/Bowie still had a writers credit on Ice Ice Baby even after they'd replaced the sample with a real bass guitar.


I think, at least that's how I remember it, and checking is hard work.



Quote from: OnlyRegisteredSoICanRead on August 06, 2019, 01:54:16 PM
But Queen/Bowie still had a writers credit on Ice Ice Baby even after they'd replaced the sample with a real bass guitar.


I think, at least that's how I remember it, and checking is hard work.


That would be a publishing credit, as it then becomes kind of a cover version. Sample replay is big business for this exact reason as it is so much easier/cheaper.

http://www.scorccio.com/

Pauline Walnuts

Original 1990 release:




By '91



That's a writing cut isn't it Shirley?

This stuff does my nut in.

NoSleep

Notice all that happened while the record was current (and was based on an unquestionable steal from another artist). This Flame bollocks has waited six years after the fact; because it is scheming bollocks. Have you seen all the "Illuminati" shite in his claim?

Petey Pate

Vanilla Ice did try and argue that it wasn't a sample.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HW_Rduet230

QuoteTheirs goes, 'Ding ding ding dingy ding-ding.' Ours goes, 'Ding ding ding ding dingy ding-ding. It's not the same.

Ice actually ended up purchasing Under Pressure as buying the song rights was cheaper than going to court.

Goldentony

Fucking Dark Horse is such a banger. Haven't heard the Flame song but hopefully Juicy J inhabits the guy with the unholy terror of JUICE.

Goldentony

Double post sorry but re: the Vanilla Ice debate - I don't know how big it would have been without the sample, but that synth line under the verses is an excellent bit of work. Such an odd, evil sounding bassline. Could have easily worked that into the chorus and avoided all this shit. Suge Knight would have ended up with the royalties though either way I suppose.

Johnny Yesno


Johnny Yesno


NoSleep

Take a look in the Adam Neely video, when he shows the paperwork (near to the beginning).

I'm no expert in music theory so I can't really disagree with the substance of his video, but that Adam Neely video is very misleading about how this case likely proceeded. Plaintiffs request jury trials because juries give bigger $$$ awards, not because they can be more easily fooled than non-expert judges who also have no background in music theory. And the implication is that the entire case was a single expert witness lying to gullible jurors, when I would bet that Katy Perry and her team spent far more on defense experts more knowledgable than Neely who failed to convince the jury for whatever reason. Basically it's a one-sided editorial on what was probably a much more complex back-and-forth between expert witnesses.

Johnny Yesno

Quote from: NoSleep on August 06, 2019, 08:58:00 PM
Take a look in the Adam Neely video, when he shows the paperwork (near to the beginning).

Ah, yes. I saw the mention of anti-Christian witchcraft, paganism and black magic, but I didn't notice that Illuminati imagery was in there too. The copyright infringement has caused Joyful Noise to be 'irreparably tarnished' by its association with these things, apparently.

These people are nutters.

NoSleep

Quote from: Pearly-Dewdrops Drops on August 07, 2019, 02:30:20 AM
I'm no expert in music theory so I can't really disagree with the substance of his video, but that Adam Neely video is very misleading about how this case likely proceeded. Plaintiffs request jury trials because juries give bigger $$$ awards, not because they can be more easily fooled than non-expert judges who also have no background in music theory. And the implication is that the entire case was a single expert witness lying to gullible jurors, when I would bet that Katy Perry and her team spent far more on defense experts more knowledgable than Neely who failed to convince the jury for whatever reason. Basically it's a one-sided editorial on what was probably a much more complex back-and-forth between expert witnesses.

I wonder if, like the Thicke/Gaye case, that the jurors weren't allowed to hear the music for themselves and were entirely reliant on the words of these expert witnesses?

Also, the brunt of the Neely video, and the Beato video, is that this is damaging to music generally and that the law needs to be changed to prevent such cases going forward. It threatens to prevent people using the bricks and mortar of putting a song and arrangement together; getting close to copyrighting standard basslines, riffs & drumbeats and even tempos without the need to prove your own complete originality in the field.

Petey Pate

Quote from: NoSleep on August 07, 2019, 08:44:15 AM
I wonder if, like the Thicke/Gaye case, that the jurors weren't allowed to hear the music for themselves and were entirely reliant on the words of these expert witnesses?

Apparently there were 'technical problems' with playing the song over the courtroom's sound system. Katy Perry offered to sing it live while testifying.

The threat is probably overblown, because I don't think jury verdicts have any precedential value. This kind of stuff has been going on forever, like when John Fogerty was sued by his former label for sounding too much like (copyrighted) John Fogerty.

I'm a fully anti-copyright but I don't really care when it's just some guy taking money from Katy Perry for a mega hit single.

Johnny Yesno

Quote from: Pearly-Dewdrops Drops on August 07, 2019, 02:30:20 AM
I would bet that Katy Perry and her team spent far more on defense experts more knowledgable than Neely who failed to convince the jury for whatever reason.

The result would suggest otherwise.

Quote from: Pearly-Dewdrops Drops on August 07, 2019, 04:05:22 PM
The threat is probably overblown, because I don't think jury verdicts have any precedential value.

It's not so much the legal precedent that's the problem, but the actual precedent of a batshit claim like this being successful. It's a green light to copyright chancers.

QuoteThis kind of stuff has been going on forever, like when John Fogerty was sued by his former label for sounding too much like (copyrighted) John Fogerty.

No, 'this kind of stuff' specifically hasn't been going on forever.

QuoteI'm a fully anti-copyright but I don't really care when it's just some guy taking money from Katy Perry for a mega hit single.

As both Neely and Beato point out, it's unpalatable having to defend Katy Perry, but the success of this ridiculous case is bad for pop music in general.

NoSleep

Quote from: Johnny Yesno on August 07, 2019, 08:51:09 PM
It's a green light to copyright chancers.

See the Spirit/Led Zeppelin case, where the Randy California, the author of the Spirit piece plus the other long-standing member were both dead before the vultures came out to make the claim. Likewise, it's dead Marvin Gaye's family suing the shit out of Thicke and Sheeran.

I don't think the artists themselves would have pursued those claims.

NoSleep

Interesting new vid from Rick Beato about how circular current pop song writing has become.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27NbNks2eg0

NoSleep

Interesting what they say about the predominance of people growing up playing musical instruments in the past. This must be a US thing as I'd say it is the other way round in the UK.

buzby

Quote from: NoSleep on August 06, 2019, 11:26:33 AM
No... Vanilla Ice sampled Queen. They own that recording of themselves.
Technically it's Universal/EMI who own the recording of Under Pressure, not Queen Music Ltd, as they don't own the mechanical rights or their masters.

Quote from: OnlyRegisteredSoICanRead on August 06, 2019, 03:37:19 PM
Original 1990 release:

By '91

That's a writing cut isn't it Shirley?
Yes, it's a writing cut - Queen Music/EMI/Beechwood (acting for Queen) and Tintoretto Music/RZO (acting for Bowie) issued a writ that was settled out of court with them getting a share of the publishing (even after the offending bassline sample had been replaced with a replayed version). The BMI database listing for the song shows the following writers:
BOWIE DAVID   (c/o Tintoretto Music/RZO)
BROWN FLOYD (c/o GPM Music)
JOHNSON MARIO LA VELL (c/o Johnson Music)
VAN WINKLE ROBERT MATTHEW (c/o Ice Baby Music)   
DEACON JOHN RICHARD
MAY BRIAN HAROLD
MERCURY FREDERICK
TAYLOR ROGER MEDDOWS (c/o Screen Gems-EMI Music/EMI Beechwood Music, who administer Queen Music's publishing library)

Quote from: Petey Pate on August 06, 2019, 04:15:33 PM
Ice actually ended up purchasing Under Pressure as buying the song rights was cheaper than going to court.
What he said in that interview on the Dan Patrick Show was patently bollocks, and when it was republished in an Ultimate Classic Rock article a spokeman for Queen refuted it after it was published, stating that the out of court settlement involved sharing the publishing royalties. Van Winkle owns a proportion of the publishing of that song, but it's a lot smaller percentage than what he had prior to the settlement.

The BMI database backs this up, as the Under Pressure is still listed as being published by Screen Gems-EMI/EMI Beechwood/Tintoretto, with no mention of Ice Baby Music.
BOWIE DAVID   (c/o Tintoretto Music/RZO)
DEACON JOHN RICHARD   
MAY BRIAN HAROLD   
MERCURY FREDERICK   
TAYLOR ROGER MEDDOWS (c/o Screen Gems-EMI Music/EMI Beechwood Music)

This is different to the George Harrison My Sweet Lord/Chiffon's He's So Fine case, where after he lost in court Harrison bought Bright Tunes Music, the publisher of the Chiffons' song, and it's catalogue then became part of the Harrisongs library (which is administered by Screen Gems-EMI's Peter Maurice Music division).

What's interesting if you listen to that track 1 medley https://youtu.be/SICVLhtOrfk is that it only contains a couple of bars of Under Pressure (supposedly replayed), but does contain a large amount of actual samples of Wild Cherry's Play That Funky Music uncredited.


Johnny Yesno

Quote from: NoSleep on August 13, 2019, 11:40:30 AM
Interesting what they say about the predominance of people growing up playing musical instruments in the past. This must be a US thing as I'd say it is the other way round in the UK.

I agree. All the kids round here these days seem to have been to BIMM.

NoSleep

I think it probably harks back to the era before music education (and libraries) were weeded from US schools. It's no coincidence that US popular music has always been at the forefront due to its history of providing a musical education for everyone, whatever your background (nowadays I think its a hallmark of privilege). It's interesting to note how the decline in music education runs alongside the emergence of Hip Hop and sampling as means to continue drawing from the resource of the musical past even as the tide was going out.