Ed Sheeran sued for allegedly infringing Marvin Gaye song copyright

[ajay_m]

This, and the "blurred lines" case are worrying. I get that, in the Sheeran case, basically the four chord progression in both these songs is essentially the same and the rhythmic feel is similar but, given how many songs must use that same progression, it's crazy to think that something that simple could somehow be copyrighted. (then again, who'd have thought that about "Happy Birthday").

And I do recall that a fragment of a "Men at Work" song, where the solo allegedly quotes a snippet from another song (which couldn't be more than a handful of notes), led to a successful copyright case against the band.

It's getting to the stage where there will have to be some kind of copyright check done on unauthorised chord progressions and where some copyright troll simply alleges copyright over every, say, 8 note sequence (there's around 430 million permutations in a major scale) but, hey, you could just have a computer generate the claim).

Anyway, hope Sheeran doesn't cave in and fights this, although a jury of course could easily find in favour of the plaintiff. I can see how a non-musical jury ignorant of the history of soul music and its roots in gospel, folk and church music is gonna say 'yeah, it's, waddya say those notes were again, C-E-F-G?' yeah, I guess, that's plagiarism. Sigh....
[Hopefully Sheeran's defence will play "Midnight Train to Georgia" which, while it has a slightly different chord sequence definitely has a very similar feel to it, just to show how much soul music is 'borrowed' from other songs]

[Hugh Robjohns]

It's very sad. Purely an opportunistic attempt at money grabbing.

[Drew Stephenson]

This is frustrating on a number of levels, including the fact that copyright is supposed to be an incentive for creation: Townsend died in 2003, how much more work is he going to create exactly?

[Forum Admin]

Is it just me or does anyone else hear Mika's "Grace Kelly" in Mr Sheeran's latest hit songle Eyes Closed?

Listen at this timestamp:

https://youtu.be/u6wOyMUs74I?t=40

[jaminem]

Is it just me or does anyone else hear Mika's "Grace Kelly" in Mr Sheeran's latest hit songle Eyes Closed?

I wish I could have my ears closed when Ed's music comes on.
I know he's wildly successful but I just don't get it. It's soooo vanilla. I just can't see the appeal.

[merlyn]

I can't say I'm worried about this or Blurred Lines. They are both cases brought where there are millions of pounds involved. Can't see that applying to me any time soon, or ever.

The fact is a chord progression cannot be copyrighted. If you're familiar with the jazz repertoire at all, there are loads of jazz standards based on the chords from Gershwin's I Got Rhythm. I can't see these historical cases being brought.

How Marvin Gaye's estate's lawyers are going to make their case, I don't know, but it isn't about ripping off a chord progression.

Recourse to the law by bringing an expensive case is unusual, and copyright is usually sorted out by some dumb bot. That's probably more of an issue for normal folks, like the classical player who got a Youtube copyright strike when uploading themself playing Bach.

[Drew Stephenson]

On the phrasing of the vocals? If so, then, "a bit."

[Forum Admin]

On the phrasing of the vocals? If so, then, "a bit."

Yes. When I first heard it in the car, it leapt out at me. Haven't mapped it onto a grid and aligned with Mika's track, but it feels like a stylistic homage to my ears.

[Hugh Robjohns]

Read any interview with a 'pop star' or other musical prodigy and one of the first questions is always "What are your musical influences?"

Seems like that's now an invitation for greedy investment bankers with fingers in famous musician's estates to file the law cases...

It's an increasingly grim money-driven world in which we live.

[Forum Admin]

Seems like that's now an invitation for greedy investment bankers with fingers in famous musician's estates to file the law cases...

It's an increasingly grim money-driven world in which we live.

AI might change a lot of this? Grimes' announcement to allow and share profits on new tracks using her AI cloned voice is an interesting move:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-65385382

[RichardT]

The trouble is that juries can do funny things. It would be better in these cases if judges made the decisions - there would be fewer hit-and-hope actions like this one.

I feel sorry for Ed - he’s already been through a gruelling copyright case brought by a couple of chancers.

In the Men at Work case, it was a melody line that was at issue so that’s a more legitimate case. This case seems to be based primarily on a chord sequence and stylistic similarities. To me at least the melodies don’t seem very similar.

[N i g e l]

The fact is a chord progression cannot be copyrighted.

there's a ton of humorous uTubes on this, eg axis of awesome
{contains swear words}
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pidokakU4I

but there is an old music meme "where theres a hit, theres a writ"

I guess that's just amplified these days.

theres only 12 notes and ears are ears, so its probably somthing else that needs to change

[Drew Stephenson]

The trouble is that juries can do funny things. It would be better in these cases if judges made the decisions - there would be fewer hit-and-hope actions like this one.

It seems to me that if they're going to have jury trials on this then they need to make it clear what elements are copyrightable, and/or create a version of the track that that just contains a midi score of those elements.
Get rid of all the distraction of style/vibe/genre etc and concentrate on where the infringement, if there is any, actually happens.

[ilikebarmouth]

I wish I could have my ears closed when Ed's music comes on.
I know he's wildly successful but I just don't get it. It's soooo vanilla. I just can't see the appeal.

Yeah, it's hideous pap. I imagine it's what drowning in a bathtub of trifle would be like if I had to listen to an album of his.

[jaminem]

I wish I could have my ears closed when Ed's music comes on.
I know he's wildly successful but I just don't get it. It's soooo vanilla. I just can't see the appeal.

Yeah, it's hideous pap. I imagine it's what drowning in a bathtub of trifle would be like if I had to listen to an album of his.

Bit harsh...I wouldn't say its hideous pap. He's clearly got something and a lot of people love him so fair play to him.

Its just that I don't.

[Wonks]

Here's Rick Beato's take on it.

https://youtu.be/B9rBN4UtkWQ

I must say that the verse backing is certainly very similar indeed. There's a chord progression, and there's playing the bass notes and drum pattern almost identically. You could certainly put Marvin singing 'Let's Get it On' over the top and most people wouldn't notice the difference.

The lyric melodies certainly differ though they are not chalk and cheese and the vocal style is quite similar.

The ES chorus is obviously very different to LGIO.

It would be very hard to say there wasn't a very strong influence of LGIO in the verses, which could certainly influence a jury who didn't fully understand the copyright technicalities but who went by their ears.

This is one Ed Sheeran, or someone in his production team, should have picked up on and had had some changes made, unless Ed really likes going to court. But maybe risking loosing 25% of the profits for one song is far outweighed by extra publicity and subsequent album/track sales?

[tea for two]

To me there's Blueprints to different styles of music from various parts of the world.
Musicians composers bands around the world adhere to these Blueprints.

There's Blues blueprints, Soul blueprints, Indian Raag blueprints, Reggae blueprints, Classical Romantic blueprints, Ambient Techno Trance blueprints, Jazz Big Band blueprints, Blast beat Metal blueprints.
So forth.
Blueprints is what makes them sound as they do, makes musicians composers bands sound as they do.

Judges juries need to understand musical Blueprints.

On Rick's vid at 33sec he compares the similarities.
The accompaniment, groove for this part of the song sounds as if it's been lifted by Ed/Ed's writing team : to me it's just taking a Blueprint.
Similarly for Let's Get It On : Marvin and his writing team The Funk Brothers took/lifted a Blueprint.

As some of the comments on Rick's vid say it's just estates lawyers who never had even an inch of input in writing the song.

Judges juries need to understand Blueprints in music writing, songwriting.

I base my music upon Blueprints.
For instance this is one of my Blues blueprints
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=71Gt46aX9 ... ZSBza3k%3D

[Drew Stephenson]

Here's Rick Beato's take on it.

https://youtu.be/B9rBN4UtkWQ

I must say that the verse backing is certainly very similar indeed. There's a chord progression, and there's playing the bass notes and drum pattern almost identically. You could certainly put Marvin singing 'Let's Get it On' over the top and most people wouldn't notice the difference.

The lyric melodies certainly differ though they are not chalk and cheese and the vocal style is quite similar.

The ES chorus is obviously very different to LGIO.

I think this is the kind of analysis that these trials need.

[Hugh Robjohns]

Common sense prevailed, Sheeran won
https://news.sky.com/story/ed-sheeran- ... n-12872670

[BJG145]

Thank goodness for that.

[tea for two]

No matter what we may or may not think of their music, three of the current largest selling music names in history are from these isles, which is a feather in the cap for these isles.

Adele, Coldplay, Ed.

[Drew Stephenson]

Common sense prevailed, Sheeran won
https://news.sky.com/story/ed-sheeran- ... n-12872670

Good news for now, but I note the penultimate paragraph suggests there may be more to come:
"Sheeran is also facing further claims about Thinking Out Loud in New York from a company that holds copyright interests in the Gaye song."

[Hugh Robjohns]

I've not followed the won case, or what the other case is based upon. It may well be it gets dropped based on the facts of this one. I suspect it was only filed opportunistically...

[OneWorld]

That's good news for Ed. Now, there's a bit from one my songs I did the other day and there is an unintended likeness to a lick from one of Ed's tunes, I wonder if he'd mind me 'borrowing' it? As it happens I called the song "It Cuts Both Ways"

[Forum Admin]

Me too… I used C, F and G in tons of my songs and Ed’s used those exact chords in some of his hits! Now, if only I can find a tame musicologist…