Hi,
 
In the end, this is going to hurt the music business!
 
And the ones that suffer the most, are always the ones that are not gaining anything, and in the end, will gain even less!
 
I'm sorry ... if I were a judge, I would tell them both ... if you were my sons, you would both get a spanking for being stupid, selfish and sick!
 
AND, I'm not into that kind of stuff!
 
All in all, this is bad. Pretty soon, you can't use a Hammond Organ anymore, because your song sounds like someone else's! And everyone has to go pay Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry because they still sound like them with effects!

This just in:
 
Capitalizing on the latest trend, Legal Systems in various countries are now suing themselves for copyright infringement.  The complaints state that current legal arguments imitate the style and form of previous arguments.  In addition, these arguments blatantly reuse previous arguments.  Physicists were caught by surprise.  Verner Von Veldmud, a noted physicist, said, "We've been looking for this breakthrough for centuries.  We never thought that perpetual motion would be discovered by lawyers!  You know, instead of colliding sub-atomic particles at CERN, perhaps we should have smashed lawyers!"  There was an awkward silence as a group of lab coat wearing scientists gave each other meaningful looks.  Suddenly, they ran back inside their bunker.
 
We'll continue to follow this story as it develops.

Hi,
 
CAREFUL UB!
Pretty soon we're going to be sued for copy'ing Bapu!
Or Emulating Bapu ... might be the better expression!
Or Mooch'ing Bapu?
I can't bapu anything, anymore!

Every now and then even the best artists produce a pile of bollox,  even I in the past have penned more than 1 "masterpiece" that luckily never saw the light of day.
 
In fact,  most successful artists will have a virtual cutting room floor of all the ideas that should never have been dragged kicking and screaming into our universe.  And these piles of dross will continue to be created and discarded by the rich and famous.
 
 
Thus I intend filing a suit against a certain Mr. P. McCartney.  ref: one of the many failures I have written in the past V's 'Un-specified, as yet to be written and discarded idea' by the said Mr. McCartney.
He's rich, he writes all the time, there is a chance (however small) that one of his worst ideas may sound something similar (to a blind horse) to one of my past failures.
 
Just PAY UP NOW Mr. McCartney.    Stop living off the backs of all us failed musicians and GIVE ME THE MONEY.  You know it's best for both of us.

bitflipper
My first reaction was WhoTF is Robin Thicke, and what a greedy ashole he must be!
 
Come to find out he's really not the villain in this story. Rather, it's Marvin Gaye's descendants who feel they have a right to a perpetual income from their forebear's labors and have been demanding payment. The purpose of RT's suit is to get a judge to declare that the two songs are not the same, thereby preempting any potential legal action by the Gaye family.
 
I downloaded the show and listened to snippits of the songs in question. There's no doubt that RT owes a debt of gratitude to Marvin Gaye - along with Smokey Robinson, Jackie Wilson, Berry Gordy, James Jamerson and the rest of the Funk Brothers. Don't we all?
 

Thanks, that was what I was thinking. Also, has everyone forgotted Led Zeppelin... they flat out stole a lot of stuff and I don't remember any lawsuits or even any bad publicity.
I am pretty sure that most music has been written already, especially in the traditional blues, jazz, soul, RnR forms... I mean how many different ways can you play three chords? People need to lighten up. If the words are different and the music isn't sampled, it is a different song. I'm not saying that anyone should get away with producing a song named Today to the tune of Yesterday... there are the mega hits and then all the album tracks and I am pretty sure that no matter what you write there is a song somewhere that it will sound like.
Sampling someone elses chops and putting them in your song unauthorized is IMO way over the line though... however I don't think that happened here, right?
All musicians borrow and steal, always have... I thought everyone knew that.
 
J

soens
Next apples will be suing oranges cauz they're a fruit.

Watermelons will be suing for slander because they are not called berrys and blackberries will sue because they are called berries. A watermeon is a berry and a blackberry is a multi podded fruit. It is Fruitist I tells ya. Fruitism is getting to be a real problem.
 

Ever heard this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dg_T6yL1gYE
 
Ian Anderson, Gayes people could learn a lot from this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xny0Uj4--tk
 
J

jbow
... I mean how many different ways can you play three chords? People need to lighten up. If the words are different and the music isn't sampled, it is a different song. I'm not saying that anyone should get away with producing a song named Today to the tune of Yesterday...  
J

Well...  you can't copyright 3 chords, or any backing, or rythm.
You can copyright the words and the melody.
 
So you can record your own version of "Yesterday" complete with guitar and strings sounding exactly the same as the orriginal, just as long as you change the words and the melody.  You could even call it "Yesterday" as the title can't be copyrighted either..

Karyn

jbow
... I mean how many different ways can you play three chords? People need to lighten up. If the words are different and the music isn't sampled, it is a different song. I'm not saying that anyone should get away with producing a song named Today to the tune of Yesterday...  
J

Well...  you can't copyright 3 chords, or any backing, or rythm.
You can copyright the words and the melody.
 
So you can record your own version of "Yesterday" complete with guitar and strings sounding exactly the same as the orriginal, just as long as you change the words and the melody.  You could even call it "Yesterday" as the title can't be copyrighted either..

In theory...
Try it and see what happens. It will be an interesting experiment... and perhaps Mr. McCartney will pay you!
 
Julien
 

After Creedence Clearwater Revival broke up, wasn't john Fogerty sued by their record company because his first solo release sounded like CCR?