So a court in America has ruled that Marvin Gaye's family should be awarded $7m because 'Blurred Lines' by Robin Thicke & Pharrell Williams apparently ripped off his song 'Got To Give It Up'. Full news story here:

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-31825059

 

What do you think about this? Personally I think it's absolute bullshit. 'Blurred Lines', whilst sounding similar in parts to Marvin Gaye's song (mostly the bassline and the beat), in no way rips off the song. Certainly none of the melody is the same. Decide for yourself by listening to this handy mash-up:

 

 

There are only 12 notes on the musical scale, so there's always going to be songs which have similarities to other songs. And yes sometimes there are songs which quite clearly rip off other songs e.g. the whole thing with Rixton's 'Me And My Broken Heart', and they acknowledged the fact that it did, and gave Rob Thomas a writing credit on it, which is fair enough. But it's a sad state of affairs if a song which sounds vaguely similar to another song gets accused of plagiarism and actually gets successfully sued for it.

Edited March 11, 201510 yr by Mango

This really is amazingly pathetic, pure desperation from Marvin's family. The song is INFLUENCED by the Marvin Gaye song - Robin has even openly admitted this! - but being influenced isn't the same as infringing copyright.

The jury system America has is laughable. Why are random citizens deciding on matters like this (or any criminal matter for that matter)? How would they know the difference between sample/cover and inspiration? Most people barely even know what a quadruple time (is that a good word? I had to translate) is.

 

On top of that I wonder if the controversy of the video might have had something to do with the decision of the jury (which consisted of 5 women and 3 men).

The beats of the songs DO sound very similar (then again, I think everything sounds similar :lol:). On the other hand, Pharrell has done songs similar to this in the past (e.g. Usher - Twisted, Madonna - Give It To Me), so I can believe he didn't copy the song, it's just the style of music he does sometimes,

 

7 million dollars might seem a ridiculous amount, but it's because it was one of the biggest hits of all time so would've made bucket-loads in royalties. If they've decided that Marvin Gaye deserves a writing credit or whatever, then his share of the money has got to be paid, and in the case of Blurred Lines, it's a LOT!

7 million dollars might seem a ridiculous amount, but it's because it was one of the biggest hits of all time so would've made bucket-loads in royalties. If they've decided that Marvin Gaye deserves a writing credit or whatever, then his share of the money has got to be paid, and in the case of Blurred Lines, it's a LOT!

 

I read in another article that Pharrell and Robin (only) made $5 million each from it, so they've effectively lost most of what they made from it now.

 

I personally think it's ridiculous, the similarity is only slight.

I think there's a Part of Sing by Ed Sheeran which Pharrell co wrote sounds almost identical to Mc Hammers U Cant Touch This. However no legal action there..

Edited March 11, 201510 yr by fiesta

In these copyright disputes they often get musicologists in to determine if the copyrights are infringed. I don't know if they did in this case, but the jury would have been given expert opinion on if the record did break the rules. They certainly would not have decided on it from a standpoint that it sounds a bit like it.

Many songwriters are hit with these law suits especially after a song they wrote sells a big amount. One of the biggest cases was George Harrisons My Sweet Lord which was a rip off of He's So Fine. The fact that Phil Spector worked with George didn't help and George lost all the money for his record.

The problem with this record is that Gaye wasn't alive to give consent. And since his death was traumatic to his family to say the least, anything that tarnishes Gaye's reputation will not go down well with them.

 

Personally I think the record was too close to the Gaye track. Therefore the judgement was probably correct.

 

This has not stopped the public downloading the two tracks and they are both back in the iTunes charts!

Shocking.

 

Seriously hope there's some sort of appeal. Disgusting.

The Gaye family are tarnishing his reputation far more with this frivolous lawsuit than Robin Thicke ever did by making a song that sounded slightly like a Marvin Gaye song but not many people even knew about that until said frivolous lawsuit.

the first time I heard blurred lines I commented in my chart blurb for that week that it was basically got to give it up. It wasn't an accidental similarity it was intentional. If u go in for tributes to past classics then u need to ensure its different enough to not fall foul of copyright. They didn't nor did they offer co writing credit. Sam Smith has just done that with Tom petty....

the first time I heard blurred lines I commented in my chart blurb for that week that it was basically got to give it up. It wasn't an accidental similarity it was intentional. If u go in for tributes to past classics then u need to ensure its different enough to not fall foul of copyright. They didn't nor did they offer co writing credit. Sam Smith has just done that with Tom petty....

Yeah the first time I ever heard 'Stay With Me', I immediately thought it sounded like the Tom Petty song. But in that case, as in the Rixton case, the two melodies were almost identical. As people have said in this thread, 'Blurred Lines' was merely influenced by the Marvin Gaye song, so it's not the same thing at all.

I think Rixton and Benny Blanco openly sampled and interpolated that melody, which was then approved, as opposed to copying it without permission then giving him a credit after someone had said something.

 

This Robin Thicke situation is absolutely ridiculous and, as was mentioned above, sheer desperation.

I really don't agree with this ruling. The melody is totally different between the two. Lots of other songs which sound much more identical to other songs (eg Viva La Vida) and no court rulings get involved with them.

 

I am not mad with Marvin Gaye's estate though as it was Robin Thicke that actually started the lawsuit against them when it was suggested they sounded similar. He should have paid those comments no attention (think people were far too distracted by the video and lyric controversy than complain about musical similarities) but instead he tried to sue them (not like he needed the cash), so they defended themselves and won. Can't really get mad at the bees when you attack the hive and end up getting stung.

I hate Blurred Lines, however I disagree with this ruling. I mean, $7 million?

Even worse is that the ruling happened yesterday, which was Robin Thicke's birthday. What a day to lose $7 million :(

The first time I heard Got To Give It Up I literally thought 'this sounds A LOT like Blurred Lines', so sadly this isn't surprising.

 

The last 12 months has truly been awful for Robin Thicke, split from his wife, massive flop of an album and now losing the money he made from his only big hit. Ouch.

I've just listened to the song and this decision is farcical. They have similar beats but that's it. Maybe a little bass is similar but they are such different songs

 

I've heard a closer link between Uptown funk and some song from the 80s than this link

The US appeals process being such that it is almost guarantee's the settlement will be quashed, if not the actual copyright infringement. For what it's worth (and as someone who had never heard the Gaye song before) if you listen to both as instrumentals then they are essentially identical. There is sampling, or paying homage to a song, but this is pretty much taking a previous song and redoing it with modern production.

Poor Robin Thicke, He probably needs that money after his last album flopped

I am not mad with Marvin Gaye's estate though as it was Robin Thicke that actually started the lawsuit against them when it was suggested they sounded similar. He should have paid those comments no attention (think people were far too distracted by the video and lyric controversy than complain about musical similarities) but instead he tried to sue them (not like he needed the cash), so they defended themselves and won. Can't really get mad at the bees when you attack the hive and end up getting stung.

 

Hmm I wasn't aware of this part of the story - I feel a little less bad for Robin now although Pharrell still seems to have been majorly screwed over here.

 

I expect there will be appeals and don't expect for a second they'll actually have to cough up $7 million but the fact this ruling was even reached is shocking.