This is a good place to drop general and weird news, entertainment, and general show prep material that might be interesting to air talent or producers. Hot dog threads ALWAYS welcome.
Posted Thu Nov 18, 2010 9:13am PST by Wendy Geller in Our Country
Lady Antebellum's "Need You Now" is one of country's biggest success stories this year--it's a certifiable crossover hit and has won several major awards, most recently Single of the Year at the 2010 Country Music Association awards last week.
Now, with all that said--here's some food for thought. Is the trio's smash single actually a ripoff of an early '80s hit?
That may seem like a far stretch. However, some people are saying so--specifically, people related to the '80s hitmaker in question, Alan Parsons of the Alan Parsons Project. Apparently, fans of the APP have been chattering about the similarities between "Need You Now" and the APP's "Eye In The Sky," a tune that approached the top of the charts back in 1982.
Alternative newsweekly Nashville Scene reported last week that a woman calling herself the "executive personal assistant" to Alan Parsons wrote in to their editor, claiming "Our fans are reaching out to us by the hundreds telling us how 'Need You Now' by Lady Antebellum is one of those 'lazy rip offs' of 'Eye In The Sky' by The Alan Parsons Project."
If all this seems a bit out of left field, a fan of the APP took the liberty of creating the following mashup to drive the point home. The tempo and pitch of both songs have been altered a bit, but it is nevertheless rather an eerie match (at least in this example). Take a listen and see what you think:
I don't think they are the same... They even had to down-pitch the LA song just to get a casually similar sound.
In a world of millions of songs, someone is bound to "copy" someone else occasionally.
Now, the Gretchen Wilson vs. The Black Crowes case has more merit IMO.
In fact, I incidentally heard the GW song on the radio last spring and immediately thought of "Jealous Again".
Not saying it's a total ripoff, but it's really close.
They may indeed have a case. Remember, no less a personage than George Harrison had to pay a settlement when the writer(s) of "He's So Fine" sued him claiming "My Sweet Lord" ripped off their melody. I'm doing this from memory, but I seem to recall Harrison was found to have unintentionally plagarized the melody, and he had to pay up.
amayo wrote:They may indeed have a case. Remember, no less a personage than George Harrison had to pay a settlement when the writer(s) of "He's So Fine" sued him claiming "My Sweet Lord" ripped off their melody. I'm doing this from memory, but I seem to recall Harrison was found to have unintentionally plagarized the melody, and he had to pay up.
And then "his " company bought "that" company so he didn't pay himself for it !
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This brings up a larger question that I've often thought about...
Will we ever get to the point that we literally run out of musical possibilities? With millions of songs being produced every year, will we literally run out of chord/note combinations?
I think there's still many possibilities left, but "overlap" is bound to happen on occasion.
I, too, find myself vindicated that others have heard the similarities that I have heard. Indeed, another former announcer of my acquaintance took great umbrage that I heard those said similarities.
I'm reminded of my time in radio when a sharp-eared advertiser became upset that his newly recorded jingle package had more than a casual sonic likeness to that of another package that we were airing (curiously, it was one of his competitors). The same company had done both jingles, and, if memory serves, he received a new, much different sounding, package.
Given the amount of music that's out there, it's up to composers, arrangers and, indeed, performers to be sure that there is a uniqueness about their products. After all, most Western music has relied--and will continue to rely--on the same basic 12 tones and rather predictable rhythm patterns.
But, do we really want to make too big a deal over it? A "borrowed" line here or there is going to happen, so let's get used to that. Just don't be egregiously obvious about it. Of course, one can argue that there's no way for anybody to be aware of all the music that's been written. Believe it or not, it used to be quite popular--even complimentary--for performers to do each other's music!
