Cat Stevens Claims Coldplay's 'Viva La Vida' Was Copied From His Song, Not Satriani's
from the hey,-the-lineup's-over-there dept
When guitarist Joe Satriani sued Coldplay for copyright infringement last December, Techdirt readers were quick to point out lots of other songs that sound similar (a great example of the importance of the conversation). Keyz noted that both songs sound a lot like a 1973 Cat Stevens tune.Guess who else noticed?
Cat Stevens (whose name is now Yusuf Islam) has accused Coldplay of copying his melody from the "Foreigner Suite" (feel free to compare). He told the U. K. Sun, "there's been this argument about Coldplay stealing this melody from Joe Satriani, but, if you listen to it, it's mine! It's the Foreigner Suite, it is!" He claimed that his decision whether or not to pursue this legally will "depend on how well Satriani does" (this wouldn't be the first such lawsuit from Islam).
The problem is, once you think about this for 6-8 seconds (the length of the melody in question)... it's just insane. Is Islam threatening Satriani too? If Coldplay used his melody, isn't Satriani also guilty? Does Satriani still feel that dagger through his heart if the melody wasn't even "his" to begin with? What about the Creaky Boards, who also claimed the song as theirs a year ago? What about all the other songs that sound similar -- Pounding (Doves), J'en Ai Marre (Alizee), Honesty (Billy Joel), Frances Limon (Enanitos Verdes), Hearts (Marty Balin)? At what point does it become obvious that it's more likely that no copying took place than that everyone is guilty of plagiarism? If anything, this accusation strengthens Coldplay's claim that this was just a coincidence.
A cynic might assume these are just blatant money grabs or publicity stunts; Satriani is demanding "any and all profits," Islam is waiting to see how well Satriani does and the accusation comes the day before his latest album release. Also, a cynical approach would explain why Islam seems to be threatening Coldplay instead of Satriani (hint: which song has made more money?), unless Islam's just letting Satriani do all the work and planning to lay claim on whatever he captures. Unfortunately, I think there may be a little honesty (no, not the Billy Joel song...) to Satriani's "dagger to the heart" comment and Islam's exclamation of "it's mine!" (my precious...). The success of "Viva La Vida" has provided the incentive to actually make these accusations real, but they do seem to be rooted in some sense of actually feeling wronged; these artists really seem to believe some sort of injustice has occurred, that no one else would have come up with the same few notes over the same few chords except by "stealing" from them. Of all people, musicians ought to know there are only so many ways to combine chords. Worrying about who came up with the idea "first" is yet another case of favoring invention over innovation, of giving a rather meaningless importance to chronology when it's really the way in which people connect with the art that's most important.
There have been successful copyright infringement lawsuits over melodies in the past, but I'm not sure that there has been such a high profile case like this with multiple people claiming infringement. Hopefully, the overlapping accusations of plagiarism backfire and actually suggest there was no wrongdoing so that a silly and complex web-of-royalties scenario is avoided for what was most likely independent creation. Here's to hoping that another two or three artists add to the chorus of accusations, further demonstrating how ridiculous this all is!
![Hide This Hide this](https://ii.techdirt.com/s/t/i/topclose.png)
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: cat stevens, coldplay, copying, copyright, joe satriani, music, plagiarism, yusuf islam
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Really Sad
Really as musicians they should both know that this particular musical "idea" may very well have been influenced by them, just as the work they did was influenced by others. Its not really a conscious thing and its about as far from "stealing" as just about anything I can imagine.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Trivia
The music to Jimmy Buffet's "Banana Republics" is the same music - slowed down - from the Beatles' "The Ballad of John and Yoko"
[ link to this | view in thread ]
This is just
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: This is just
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: This is just
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Lie in wait
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: This is just
And for the slashdot crowd.
1. Generate all chord progressions
2. publish
3. ???
4. PROFIT!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: Re: This is just
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: Re: This is just
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: This is just
This almost seems like a partial game tree search problem. The trick would be to understand what makes a chord progression sound good (not a small feat). Even if incredibly large you could build up a rather impressive 'library' over time.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: This is just
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Yusuf
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Uh...no
Erm...thats called a scale...
All music is based on melodies, which are smaller, repeating sections of music that sometimes vary slightly from measure to measure. These melodies by definition have a finite amount of chords in their structure. Within that, there are only so many chord structures that are going to sound good, or alternatively, that most musicians will use. Sure, you CAN have a much larger amount of POSSIBLE chord progressions, but in practical terms, its actually pretty limited as to what people will actually use. Anything else (the "infinite" you refer to) would be nothing more than constantly changing chords with no fixed melodies, and no one is interested in making music like that, as no one wants to listen to random chords (see ANY child experimenting with any instrument, ever).
[ link to this | view in thread ]
All songwriters copy.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: This is just
...but not Coldplay.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Coldplay's song isn't anywhere nearly as close to either of them.
Reminds me of the Isaac Asimov story where every possible combination of notes has been used and copyrighted.
How hard would it be to capture every permutation of 30sec (is 15sec enough) of music and play it to a small audience that votes. At some threshold, you keep the piece and start searching for anyone who uses it in the future and sue them.
I think I'll patent that business process now.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
I keep remembering an interview with Vanilla Ice where they asked if he "borrowed" the base line to the Queen song.
Ice said, "No way, if you listen very carefully, their song goes 'bum bum bum bumbumbum.....' while ours goes "bum bum bum bumbumbum.....tic!' The whole damn thing was just ridiculous, much like this lawsuit.
And finally, there are no original chord progressions or songs left:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdxkVQy7QLM
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: All songwriters copy.
Here's the full quote from the poet, which is amazingly appropriate to the situation at hand and to the general topic of asinine applications of copyright.
"One of the surest tests [of the superiority or inferiority of a poet] is the way in which a poet borrows. Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different. The good poet welds his theft into a whole of feeling which is unique, utterly different than that from which it is torn; the bad poet throws it into something which has no cohesion. A good poet will usually borrow from authors remote in time, or alien in language, or diverse in interest."
- T.S. Elliot
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: All songwriters copy.
Yeah I agree with you guys, this is what I was trying to say earlier as well. Musicians (as I assume most artists are) are the result of their influences. There is no Satriani without John McLaughlin and no McLaughlin without Chet Atkins no Chet without Charlie Christian, on and on. What makes this particular situation especially disappointing is both these guys are accomplished enough musicians to know this (certainly Satriani is). Everything both these guys have ever created was made up largely of ideas they got other places, not consciously, not by stealing, but through the basic personally subjective learning of whats pleasing and whats not. This lawsuit is not only ridiculous because of its merits, it’s also disappointing because of its plaintiff (who should know the difference).
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Not Plagiarism
Now of course this was absolutely plagiarism, but it was quite unintended. He of course changed his tune, but I think this illustrates something. His subconscious assimilated that tune and out it came. Until I pointed out the original he had no idea that he was literal plagiarizing the tune. But this is pretty much how all composition work. It might be a fragment of a melody or a chord progression, but usually it is not an asserted effort to plagiarize, but rather a natural subconscious happening. I can't tell you the number of times I start humming what I think is going to be a lovely new melody to suddenly break out in the song with which it was inspired.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Not for what you're thinking, but by finding a ligit excuse to link to Alizee.... Well played...
But eh, they're all just a ripoff of the Fairy Theme from Zelda... you all know it's true...
In all honesty, this reminds me of an old (early 90's) sci-fi short story that came up with the scenario that Chess is no longer a game that can be played by grand masters, because every single game of chess has been played.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Look out Oasis
In an interview with Nuno Bettencourt (from Extreme) in Guitar Player magazine years ago I remember him saying something that really stuck with me all these years. It was along the lines of "There hasn't been a truly original melody written in a long time, the greats all wrote them centuries ago. All we do now is interpret them in our own form."
[ link to this | view in thread ]
That's what Danny Pearl thought about his last Islamic acquaintance.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Something just died inside me. :(
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Really Sad
I wonder how Shitriani feels now that he has more in common with Yourself LaSpleef than any *real* musician?
CBMHB
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: All songwriters copy.
Hulser wrote:
No, it was Pablo Picasso who actually said “Good artists borrow, great artists steal”. A bit closer to the point than T S Eliot, don’t you think?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Cave Man's Gotta Get Paid
I started banging on a tree stump a long time ago
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Yusuf
I'm surprised he's dirtying his hands with infidel law - I would have expected him to invoke Sharia law on Coldplay and demand to have their hands cut off. But of course that wouldn't get him any filthy infidel cash.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
You don't want to know what the punishment is for jerking off in public.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: All songwriters copy.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: This is just
[ link to this | view in thread ]
They all stole from me ...
I started banging on a tree stump a long time ago
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Yusuf
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Depeche Mode & Life in Technicolor ii
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Can't really be that bad though.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Cat Stevens authorship
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Not Plagiarism
[ link to this | view in thread ]
If its an old folk tune its in the public domain,
i think dylan might have used some old folk songs that were in the public domain .i,m not a lawyer i don,t know can someone copyright a particular arrangement
of a song thats in the public domain and sue someone else over using that arrangement .
[ link to this | view in thread ]