Plagiarism?

[dragonboy]

This thread never really got going  ;)

[dragonboy]

Obviously I generalized about hip-hop, but damn it it's hard to praise a genre that uses canned samples and melodies as a composing tool, writing credit or not. I like hip-hop too. I like Outcast, The Beasties, Grand Master Flash, Missy Elliot, KRS-One, Eminem and many more.

No love for the Roots? They're the best example of 'live' Hip-Hop IMO.

[dragonboy]

Way to stand up for the hip hop community DB!! Holla!

White boyz reprezent!  ;)

http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=f7-E1qTVJgE

[Jaimoe]

Obviously I generalized about hip-hop, but damn it it's hard to praise a genre that uses canned samples and melodies as a composing tool, writing credit or not. I like hip-hop too. I like Outcast, The Beasties, Grand Master Flash, Missy Elliot, KRS-One, Eminem and many more.

No love for the Roots? They're the best example of 'live' Hip-Hop IMO.

I like The Roots too. And I really like Canadian hip-hop star k-os. If you don't know him, check him out. Canada only has a few hip-hoppers that have "broken" into the States and he's one of them. Belly is another (I hate him). k-os is more organic and melodic than most.

[joey_rogo]

allow me to throw my 2 cents in......... coldplay definitely ripped off joe's song. that is all.

[capt. scotty]

Obviously I generalized about hip-hop, but damn it it's hard to praise a genre that uses canned samples and melodies as a composing tool, writing credit or not. I like hip-hop too. I like Outcast, The Beasties, Grand Master Flash, Missy Elliot, KRS-One, Eminem and many more.

No love for the Roots? They're the best example of 'live' Hip-Hop IMO.

I like The Roots too. And I really like Canadian hip-hop star k-os. If you don't know him, check him out. Canada only has a few hip-hoppers that have "broken" into the States and he's one of them. Belly is another (I hate him). k-os is more organic and melodic than most.

k-os is the shit...I got Exit and Joyful Rebellion..Still need to get a hold of Atlantis..I like his diverse style, but I would like to see him stick to the straight hip hop stuff more often like Fantastique, Freeze, Neutroniks...

No matter what though, most of his stuff I like a lot

[dragonboy]

I'll have to check him out...

[dragonboy]

Bill Melendez guilty of plagiarism?!!

http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=KGnYw-OuCnI

[corey]

I found this on another board I frequent:

Damning evidence against Coldplay.
From 2005.

In a recent interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Coldplay front man Chris Martin has admitted to plagiarizing many, if not most, of the songs he wrote. Specifically, Chris said:

"We're definitely good, but I don't think you can say we're that original," he notes. "I regard us as being incredibly good plagiarists."

[Jaimoe]

Obviously I generalized about hip-hop, but damn it it's hard to praise a genre that uses canned samples and melodies as a composing tool, writing credit or not. I like hip-hop too. I like Outcast, The Beasties, Grand Master Flash, Missy Elliot, KRS-One, Eminem and many more.

No love for the Roots? They're the best example of 'live' Hip-Hop IMO.

I like The Roots too. And I really like Canadian hip-hop star k-os. If you don't know him, check him out. Canada only has a few hip-hoppers that have "broken" into the States and he's one of them. Belly is another (I hate him). k-os is more organic and melodic than most.

k-os is the shit...I got Exit and Joyful Rebellion..Still need to get a hold of Atlantis..I like his diverse style, but I would like to see him stick to the straight hip hop stuff more often like Fantastique, Freeze, Neutroniks...

No matter what though, most of his stuff I like a lot

Joyful Rebellion is a fantastic album. One of the best Canadian albums of this decade bar none, and the competition is pretty solid when you take into account seminal albums from Arcade Fire, Broken Social Scene etc...

I've met Kevin, aka k-os, and he's a weird dude for sure. Talented, but weird.

[dragonboy]

I found this on another board I frequent:

Damning evidence against Coldplay.
From 2005.

In a recent interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Coldplay front man Chris Martin has admitted to plagiarizing many, if not most, of the songs he wrote. Specifically, Chris said:

"We're definitely good, but I don't think you can say we're that original," he notes. "I regard us as being incredibly good plagiarists."

;D ;D ;D

Cheers for that Corey!

Pretty much case closed then, don't I look a fool  :-[

[ycartrob]

I still like Gwyneth

[Ghostess on TV]

I still like Gwyneth

Hahaha!  ;D

[joey_rogo]

dammit tracy, that post nearly killed me.

this smiley is for you bud......... :D

[capt. scotty]

You bring up a good point Joey..

Kudrow vs. Paltrow

..whose your preference??!?!?


This would make for a very interesting thread I think, but maybe thats just me  ::)

[joey_rogo]

well capt,

in order to choose between, i would need more time to think...

im not gonna divulge my choice here... unless a new thread is made. its a tough one.

i dont wanna take away from the original topic....


derp

[Ghosts_on_TV]

Say it ain't so, Joe: Coldplay have issued a response to a lawsuit filed against the band late last week by six-string scientist Joe Satriani, who claims the UK megastars ripped off his "If I Could Fly" for their "Viva la Vida". And what do you know, they're standing their ground.

Quoth a statement on Coldplay's website [via Billboard.com], "With the greatest possible respect to Joe Satriani, we have now unfortunately found it necessary to respond publicly to his allegations. If there are any similarities between our two pieces of music, they are entirely coincidental, and just as surprising to us as to him."

They continue, "Joe Satriani is a great musician, but he did not write the song 'Viva la Vida'. We respectfully ask him to accept our assurances of this and wish him well with all future endeavors." Well that's nice, dudes, what about the real victim in this whole mess: that one Brooklyn band?

Billboard.com also points to a recent Musicradar.com interview with Joe Satriani, in which Joe the Guitarist waxes emo about the alleged act of plagiarism: "I felt like a dagger went right through my heart. It hurt so much."

He also says some less corny things: "Everybody assumes I'm trying to go after these guys in Coldplay, as if I'm doing this with malice. That's the furthest thing from my mind. I'm just doing what I need to do as an artist, to protect what's mine, to protect those feelings I put down in song.

"I did everything I could to avoid a court case with this situation. But Coldplay didn't want to talk about it. They just wanted this whole thing to go away. Maybe they figured this little guitar player guy will leave them alone after a while, I don't know. But we're talking about a piece of art that I created, and that's something I feel is important. I think everybody should feel that way."

Both plaintiff and defendant then took baths in enormous pools full of money.

Regardless of the actions of any little guitar player guys, Coldplay are all set to tour the bejesus out of 2009

[dragonboy]

http://www.mojo4music.com/blog/2008/12/coldplay_vs_joe_satriani_the_v_1.html

Plagiarism, legal lunacy, or just a case of two useless applications of one duh-obvious idea? MOJO's Mat Snow decides...

WITH THE END OF THE WORLD as we know it rattling all four sets of hooves, it was reassuring to learn that, even in these uncertain times, where there's a hit, just as surely there's still a writ. Last Thursday Joe Satriani filed court papers in LA claiming that Coldplay's hit Viva La Vida used "substantial original portions" of his 2004 instrumental If I Could Fly. The stunt-guitarist wants a jury trial and is seeking damages and "any and all profits" for the alleged plagiarism. In this day and age, where everybody is just a premium-rate call or text away from having a say, why stop with just 12 angry men? We all want our two cents. Let the court rise...

Exhibit A: the monster mash

Unusually for a set of fingers famous for fizzing down the frets, Joe was slow to punch his lawyer's number. His fans, however, have been on the case since June when not only was the resemblance between his 2004 tune and the Coldplay hit noted in blogposts, but a smart alec mashed the two tunes together (to get them exactly in sync, Coldplay were speeded up to borderline Chipmunks pitch) and uploaded it to YouTube. Good game! But did Coldplay actually, to use that terrific Swiss Army knife word for disreputable deeds, 'jack' the Satch's track? Let precedent be our guide...

Grand theft auto?

In 1969, John Lennon paid tribute to one of his all-time heroes, Chuck Berry, by adapting the first line of the future bathroom voyeur's You Can't Catch Me for the first line of his own Come Together ("Here come old flat-top, he come grooving up slowly") on The Beatles' Abbey Road, a tip of the titfer from a disciple to his master which acknowledged a groovy classic and enriched the tradition without impoverishing the original by so much as a cent in financial or cultural credit. And how did Chuck's publisher, Morris Levy, respond? By proving copyright law an ass with a suit which forced Lennon to record a whole album of tunes from his catalogue. Fortunately, that album was the wonderful if currently unfashionable Rock'N'Roll.

But with Satch vs the world's second-favourite U2 soundalikes (after U2), we're not talking one line. We're talking the entire chord progression and basic melody — like the man says, "substantial original portions".

Self-abuse?

Twenty years ago John Fogerty found himself suing his own be-denimed ass for plagiarism when his old Fantasy label boss, Saul Zaentz, submitted that the new Fogerty tune, The Old Man Down The Road, ripped off an old Fogerty tune, Run Through The Jungle by Creedence Clearwater Revival, a Fantasy recording. Armed with his guitar, the Fog took the stand to demonstrate to the jury that while a cloth-eared money-grubber might not be able to distinguish one choogling tune from another, people who actually bought records surely could. Fogerty won (and lost).

Sadly, in the current instance, I could find no proof that "Satch" and the band who seem to have inspired no affectionate nicknames whatsoever among the fans (not even "The Coldies" or "The 'Play") are one and the same.

The sweet Lord's inspiration?

Tunes – they come out of thin air, don't they? So said George Harrison when accused by the publishers of The Chiffons' He's So Fine of copying the gal-group classic for his Krishna-worshipping global smash My Sweet Lord. No dice, son, said the US federal court. Likewise Rod Stewart's unsuccessful defence of his hit Da Ya Think I'm Sexy against a plagiarism suit from Brazilian musician Jorge Ben Jor proving its derivation from his song Taj Mahal.

When the law establishes the legal similarity of one song to another, the copyright-owner of the second song has little defence against charges of copying from the first, however far removed the artists are in genre and circumstance. So even if you cannot imagine Keith Richards sitting down to enjoy the wistful Sapphic elegance of kd lang, you can't deny the possibility that he might have half-cocked an ear to her 1992 hit Constant Craving if his missus had it on the kitchen radio when he popped to the fridge for a fresh blood transfusion. Hence the Stones' forestalled any legal action just before the release of their 1997 single Anybody Seen My Baby? by cutting in lang and co-writer Ben Mink to the credits, a simple courtesy and painless payday that moved kd to declare herself "completely honored and flattered".

The verdict

It doesn't look good for the British Grammy hopefuls. Sure, the idea of Coldplay guitarist Jonny Buckland bending a studious ear to a Satch album and deliberately copping his tune sounds far-fetched. But that's no defence in law. Copying doesn't have to be conscious, still less cold-blooded. Coldplay's best tactic might be to admit that Viva La Vida's chord sequence is embarrassingly bog-standard, and the melody follows it with all the inevitability of the bleeding obvious. In other words, second-rate musical minds might easily and innocently think alike. But if I was on that jury of hard-working joes plucked from honest jobs (if they've still got 'em) to decide between a self-made all-American trick-bag axeman and a bunch of atheist Brits whose stock in trade is making marriage to your very own Gwyneth Paltrow the recipe for unending and lucrative miserabilism, well... need I say more?

The sentence

Fortunately, the American fondness for litigation is matched by their judicial creativity in apportioning redress. If the Coldplay tune is one of the most half-arsed in a long and dreary list of forgettable worldwide Number 1s, Satch's If I Could Fly is no Beck's Bolero either. But jam them together and you have a full and glorious arse of a record to stick in your iPod next to Tom Petty's Free Fallin' and Boston's More Than A Feeling. Make 'em do it, your honour, with proceeds to the charity of Satch's choice. Justice is blind, but no reason for it to be deaf.

Mat Snow

[BH]

Clever story, thanks db.