State Champ Radio Legal News
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This is The Legal Beat, a weekly newsletter about music law from Billboard Pro, offering you a one-stop cheat sheet of big new cases, important rulings, and all the fun stuff in between. This week: A murder case against rapper YNW Melly turns into an appellate battle over the death penalty, Phoebe Bridgers defeats a producer’s defamation lawsuit, Megan Thee Stallion wins a restraining order against her label, and much more.
THE BIG STORY: YNW Melly Could Face Death Penalty
Three years after he was arrested and charged with first-degree murder, YNW Melly has found himself at the center of a legal battle over the death penalty, with a trip to the Florida Supreme Court looming next.If you haven’t been following: Melly (real name Jamell Demons) faces two counts of murder over accusations that he and another rapper, YNW Bortlen, shot and killed Anthony “YNW Sakchaser” Williams and Christopher “YNW Juvy” Thomas Jr. in 2018.A first-degree murder defendant in Florida would typically face the possibility of execution if convicted. But earlier this year, Melly’s attorneys argued that the state had forfeited the right to seek capital punishment by failing to comply with strict laws on how they must warn defendants that they’ll do so.Florida requires prosecutors to give notice 45 days after arraignment if they plan to seek capital punishment. In Melly’s case, the state attorney filed such notice when they originally indicted the rapper in 2019, but they then failed to do so when they re-charged him with a so-called superseding indictment earlier this year. In July, a state trial judge sided with Melly’s lawyers, taking the death penalty off the table.But in a ruling last week, a state appeals court overturned that decision. Since prosecutors gave notice that they might seek death when they first charged him, the court said they had complied with state rules – and more importantly, had avoided the due process problems the rules were designed to safeguard against.“Notice is notice,” the court wrote in its opinion. “The defendant has had nearly three years to start the preparation of his defense to the state seeking the death penalty [and] the record contains no evidence that the defendant was prejudiced in any way.”The ruling likely won’t be the last on Melly’s case. In handing down its decision, the appeals court certified that the case dealt with novel legal questions that are of “great public importance” to the state of Florida – meaning they should be decided by the state’s Supreme Court.In a statement to Billboard, Melly’s attorney Philip R. Horowitz said he and his client were “disappointed in the ruling” but “look forward to our opportunity to argue our position before the justices.”
Other top stories this week…
PHOEBE SLAPPS DOWN LAWSUIT – A Los Angeles judge tossed out a lawsuit against Phoebe Bridgers that accused her of defaming producer/studio owner Chris Nelson, citing California’s anti-SLAPP law that’s designed to protect free speech against questionable lawsuits. Nelson’s lawsuit claimed that Bridgers lied about him in a series of October 2020 Instagram posts, in which the singer amplified accusations of abuse made against him by another woman. Her lawyers then fired back that Nelson was just using the lawsuit to “chill Ms. Bridgers’ allegations of abusive conduct, which are protected by the First Amendment.” Though Judge Curtis A. Kin sided with that argument last week, he did not issue a written ruling explaining the decision. Nelson has already vowed to appeal; a rep for Bridgers said the star felt “vindicated that the court recognized this lawsuit as frivolous and without merit.”MEGAN THEE PLAINTIFF – A judge in Texas sided with Megan Thee Stallion and granted her a restraining order against her record label 1501 Certified Entertainment, issued after she claimed that the company “unlawfully” took steps “to block or interfere” with her ability to use her music in the lead-up to the AMAs on Sunday. The order bars the company from “preventing or blocking the use and exploitation” of Megan’s music in promotional content for the AMAs. The tussle ahead of the awards show is the latest front in a years-long legal war between Megan and 1501. She claims the label duped her into signing an unfair contract and has retaliated against her for challenging it; the company claims Megan, with the help of Jay-Z’s Roc Nation, is using baseless litigation merely as a vehicle to escape a deal she “no longer likes.”YE SUED YET AGAIN – Kanye West is facing a new copyright lawsuit over allegations that his “Life of the Party” illegally sampled from 1986 song “South Bronx” by the pioneering rap group Boogie Down Productions. The company that currently owns BDP’s copyrights says West’s people reached out to clear the sample, but then released it anyway when a deal was never struck. The case is the latest in a string of such infringement case against the embattled rapper, who (amid many, many other problems) has been repeatedly sued for failing to secure licenses for samples.THEIR LOSS? – Just days after Condé Nast sued Drake and 21 Savage for using a fake cover story in Vogue magazine to promote their new album Her Loss, a federal judge issued a restraining order forcing them to stop using it. The judge ruled that the cover – one of several fake promos for the album – was likely violating the publisher’s trademarks because Drake and 21 were “misleading consumers” and “deceiving the public.” DJ SUED FOR NFT PROFITS – 3LAU was hit with a lawsuit claiming the DJ refused to properly share the earnings from an $11 million NFT auction with Luna Aura, a musical collaborator who co-authored one of the songs involved. Aura claims she owns a 50% royalty stake in the song “Walk Away” from his album Ultraviolet — but that 3LAU (real name Justin Blau) offered her just $25,000 from the much-publicized NFT auction tied to the record: “Despite this financial windfall, defendants only offered Luna Aura a flat one-time payment.” 3LAU’s reps said the case was “without merit” and came as a surprise after months of negotiations.BANKROLL FREDDIE ARRESTED – Rapper Bankroll Freddie (Freddie Gladney III) was arrested in Arkansas on federal gun and drug charges, part of a sweeping bust across the state that saw 80 defendants indicted and 45 arrested, including his father Freddie Gladney Jr. The rapper, signed to Quality Control, is facing 11 total charges, including various drug possessions and possession of a machine gun.
Attorneys for Dua Lipa are asking a federal judge to quickly toss out a lawsuit claiming she stole her smash hit song “Levitating” from a little-known reggae track, calling the allegations “speculative,” “vague” and supported by little real evidence.
Members of the Florida band Artikal Sound System sued Lipa earlier this year, claiming her 2020 smash hit – which spent 77 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 chart – borrowed its core hook from their 2017 song “Live Your Life.”
But in a motion to dismiss the case filed Monday (Nov. 14), Lipa’s lawyers said there was no sign that anyone involved in creating “Levitating” ever even had access to the earlier song – a key requirement in any copyright lawsuit. Artikal Sound System’s attempts to show such a connection, they said, were “tortured.”
“They amount to nothing more than a speculative, attenuated theory based on numerous degrees of separation, none of which establish any link — let alone a concrete link — between the writers of ‘Levitating’ and ‘Live Your Life,’” wrote Lipa’s lawyers from the firm Mitchell Silberberg & Knupp LLP.
“Plaintiffs are essentially seeking to plead access,” the star’s legal team wrote, “by alleging that someone who knows someone who knows someone might have met one of the ‘Levitating’ writers.”
“Levitating,” released in 2020 on Lipa’s second studio album Future Nostalgia, was a massive hit, eventually peaking at No. 2 on the Hot 100 and securing the honor of being the longest-running top 10 song ever by a female artist on the chart.
Artikal Sound System is a reggae band based out of South Florida, founded in 2012 as a duo before later adding additional musicians and vocalist Logan Rex. The band released “Live Your Life” on its 2017 EP Smoke and Mirrors.
In their March lawsuit, the band said the songs sounded so similar that it was “highly unlikely that ‘Levitating’ was created independently.” The lawsuit also named Warner Records, as well as others who helped create the hit track.
In Monday’s filing, beyond arguing that Lipa and other writers never heard the song, her lawyers also said Artikal Sound System failed to show that the songs were similar enough to constitute copyright infringement. The complaint is full of “vague, boilerplate labels and conclusions,” they said, but “devoid of a shred of factual detail”
“Plaintiffs fail to allege a single fact that identifies what material from ‘Live Your Life’ is copied in ‘Levitating’,” Lipa’s lawyers wrote. “Instead, Plaintiffs merely conclusorily allege purported similarities between the two works without any factual detail whatsoever.”
An attorney for Artikal Sound System did not immediately return a request for comment on Tuesday.
The current case is one of two lawsuits Lipa is facing over “Levitating.” The other, filed just days later, claims she and the other writers lifted material from both a 1979 song called “Wiggle and Giggle All Night” and a 1980 song called “Don Diablo.” That case is still pending in a different court.
Mariah Carey might be the “Queen of Christmas,” but a new legal ruling means she won’t be able to stop others from using the same name.
In a decision issued Tuesday, a tribunal at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office rejected Carey’s application to register the royal title as a federal trademark. The decision went in favor of Elizabeth Chan, another singer who says she’s used the same name for years.
Chan filed a legal case against Carey in August, arguing that “Christmas is big enough for more than one Queen.” After that, Carey never responded to the case or defended her applications for the trademarks, prompting the Trademark Office to rule in favor of Chan by default.
“We are pleased with the victory, and delighted that we were able to help Elizabeth fight back against Carey’s overreaching trademark registrations,” said Tompros, an attorney at the law firm WilmerHale.
In the same statement, Chan herself added: “Christmas is a season of giving, not the season of taking, and it is wrong for an individual to attempt to own and monopolize a nickname like Queen of Christmas for the purposes of abject materialism.”
Carey’s attorney did not return a request for comment on the decision.
In a statement, Chan’s lawyer Louis Tompros called Carey’s efforts to secure legal protection over the “Queen” name “a classic case of trademark bullying” – a term used to criticize overly-aggressive trademark protection by big brands.
Likely playing on her perennial smash hit “All I Want For Christmas Is You,” Carey’s company (Lotion LLC) applied last year to register the “Queen” name as an exclusive brand name for a variety of different goods and services, ranging from music to alcohol to fragrances.
Trademarks are different than copyrights, and they do not give someone blanket ownership over particular words. If Carey had won the registrations and wanted to sue someone, she still would have needed to prove that consumers had confused the two brand names – not always an easy task, particularly with a fairly unoriginal name like “Queen of Christmas.”
But such registrations are still important, and would have empowered Carey’s company to start threatening litigation and crowding out others from using it in similar commercial contexts. That potentially would include Chan, who calls her self “pop music’s only full-time Christmas singer” and says she’s also been repeatedly dubbed the “Queen of Christmas.”
The risk of such litigation prompted Chan to file her August case at the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board, a court-like body within the USPTO that decides disputes over who is entitled to register particular trademarks. Repped by Tompros, she argued that no single singer or company should be able to lock up the title.
“Ms. Carey can call herself whatever she wants, but she shouldn’t have the ability to block others from doing the same,” Tompros said at the time.
It’s unclear exactly what motivated Carey and her lawyers (from the elite trademark law firm Fross Zelnick) to file the applications, particularly after she gave an interview in December in which she seemed to disclaim the title: “To me, Mary is the Queen of Christmas.”
The dispute over the “Queen” title prompted some fun wrangling among other Christmas “queens.” Darlene Love jokingly urged Carey to “call my lawyer,” noting that David Letterman had “officially declared me the Queen of Christmas 29 years ago.” And just last week, Dolly Parton quickly conceded the title to Carey after an interviewer suggested that Parton might be “the new Queen of Christmas.”
“Now, don’t you say that! I’m not going to compete with Mariah,” Parton said in the interview with Better Homes and Gardens. “I love her. You think of Christmas, you think of Mariah.”
“Is it true that Mariah Carey trademarked ‘Queen of Christmas?’ What does that mean that I can’t use that title?” Love asked in the post. “At 81 years of age I’m NOT changing anything. I’ve been in the business for 52 years, have earned it and can still hit those notes! If Mariah has a problem call David or my lawyer!!”
The ongoing legal battle between Megan Thee Stallion and her label 1501 Certified Entertainment has taken another nasty turn around this weekend’s American Music Awards.
According to court documents obtained by Billboard, the “Savage” rapper (born Megan Pete) was granted a restraining order against 1501, along with her distributor 300 Entertainment, after claiming 1501 “unlawfully” took steps “to block or interfere with Pete exploiting, licensing, or publishing her music” in the lead-up to the upcoming AMAs on Sunday (Nov. 20). Filed in Harris County District Court in Texas, the order says Megan “provided evidence” that the company “recently engaged and will continue to engage in threatening and retaliatory behavior that will irreparably harm” her music career.
Without providing further detail on what 1501 or 300 allegedly did, the court notes that it filed an ex parte order — essentially, a type of emergency order granted without waiting for a response from the other side — “because there was not enough time to give notice to Defendants, hold a hearing, and issue a restraining order before the irreparable injury, loss, or damage would occur.” It adds that voting for the AMAs, where Megan is nominated for favorite female hip-hop artist, closes on Monday night (Nov. 14) at midnight, and that Megan “will suffer irreparable harm if her music cannot be used in conjunction with her promotion for the AMAs.”
Under the order, 1501, 300 and anyone acting “in concert or participation with” them are restricted from “preventing or blocking the use and exploitation” of Megan’s music in promotional content for the AMAs, — including by “threatening or otherwise attempting to intimidate or coerce” third parties not to use it — through Nov. 20. It also sets a hearing on Megan’s restraining order request for Nov. 22.
The restraining order is just the latest volley in a more than two-year-old legal battle that began in 2020 when Megan filed a lawsuit alleging that 1501 founder Carl Crawford tricked her into signing an “unconscionable” record deal in 2018 that was well below industry standards. She claims that upon signing a management deal with Jay-Z‘s Roc Nation the following year, she got “real lawyers” who showed her that the 1501 agreement was “crazy.”
In February, Megan filed a separate lawsuit claiming 1501 had refused to count her 2021 Something for Thee Hotties release as an album — a pivotal definition, as her 1501 deal states that she must produce three albums to fulfill her obligations. 1501 quickly countersued, arguing that Thee Hotties included just 29 minutes of original material and therefore didn’t qualify.
In September, Megan filed yet another lawsuit seeking more than $1 million in damages, claiming that 1501 “systematically failed” to pay her the proper amount of royalties she was owed and had “wrongfully allowed for excessive marketing and promotion charges,” in addition to allegations that the label leaked her most recent album Traumazine. In response, attorneys for the label argued it was actually Megan who had failed to pay 1501 its fair share of money she made from endorsements, partnerships and other business deals, as well as requirements related to publishing royalties. They further added that any claims of underpayment of royalties should be redirected to 300 Entertainment.
Representatives from 1501 and 300 did not immediately respond to Billboard‘s request for comment.
Megan Thee Stallion and Big Sean have reached a settlement with two little-known Detroit rappers, ending a lawsuit claiming the hip-hop superstars ripped off an earlier song with their 2020 collaboration “Go Crazy.”
In a lawsuit filed in July, Duawn “Go Hard Major” Payne and Harrell “H Matic” James claimed that Megan’s song sounded so much like their 2012 track “Krazy” that there was no way it had been created independently without illegal copying.
But just four months later, attorneys for the pair of accusers notified a federal judge Friday (Nov. 11) that the two sides had “reached an agreement in principle to settle their dispute in its entirety.”
The public filing did not disclose any terms of the agreement, like whether any money would exchange hands or songwriting credits would be altered. Attorneys for both sides did not immediately return requests for more details.
“Go Crazy,” released on Stallion’s 2020 debut album Good News, didn’t chart as a single, but the album spent 75 weeks on the Billboard 200 and peaked at No. 2 in December 2020. The song featured both Big Sean and 2 Chainz, though the latter was not named in the current lawsuit.
In their July 25 complaint, Payne and James claimed that various aspects of “Krazy” and “Go Crazy” are “nearly identical,” including the wording of the chorus, melodic and harmonic sequences and the use of cadence.
“An average lay observer would recognize the infringing work as having been appropriated from [‘Krazy’] because of the striking similarity between the two compositions and the way in which they are performed,” said the complaint.
Since “Krazy” was never released by a label, the attorneys for the two accusers made a creative, hyper-local argument for why Stallion or Big Sean had enough “access” to the song that they were able to copy it — a key requirement in any copyright infringement lawsuit. They said Payne and James had performed the song in “West Detroit hip hop clubs and bars” where Big Sean — a Motor City native — had frequently gone. The pair also sold “thousands of physical copies of CDs” in the parking lots of those same clubs, their lawyers argued.
3LAU is facing a new lawsuit that claims the DJ refused to properly share the earnings from an $11 million NFT auction with a musical collaborator who co-authored one of the songs involved.
In a complaint filed Wednesday (Nov. 9) in New York federal court, Luna Aura (real name Angela Anne Flores) says she has a 50% royalty stake in the song “Walk Away” from his album Ultraviolet — but that 3LAU (real name Justin Blau) offered her just $25,000 from the much-publicized NFT auction tied to the record.
“Despite this financial windfall, defendants only offered Luna Aura a flat one-time payment of twenty-five thousand dollars as compensation in connection with the sale of Ultraviolet and ‘Walk Away’ NFTs,” her lawyers wrote.
Even during last year’s fever-dream craze for NFTs (non-fungible tokens), 3LAU’s Feb. 2021 auction stood out as notable. By selling 33 collectible tokens linked to his 3-year-old album Ultraviolet — the NFTs gave the buyers access to vinyl copies, unreleased music and other special experiences — the DJ-producer raked in $11.7 million. “It was one of those moments in my life where I was like, ‘Holy s—,’” 3LAU told Billboard at the time. “‘I think we just changed everything.’”
But according to Aura’s new lawsuit, he didn’t share those profits with a key person who helped create the album. She says the auction was done without any notice to her, and that the sale breached her 2017 agreement with Blau, which guaranteed her a 50 percent publishing royalty on “Walk Away.”
“Luna Aura has not received any compensation from revenues generated from the NFT project, nor has Luna Aura [received] appropriate credit in connection with the ‘Walk Away’ and Ultraviolet NFTs,” her lawyers wrote. “Despite the commercial and financial success of the NFT auction, defendants only offered Luna Aura an after-the-fact, one-time payment.”
The lawsuit did not specify how much Aura believes is an appropriate cut from the Ultraviolet NFTs but demanded an accounting to determine how much is owed.
A representative for 3LAU did not immediately return a request for comment on Thursday.
A Florida appeals court ruled Wednesday that YNW Melly could face the death penalty if convicted in his upcoming murder trial, overturning a judge’s decision that prosecutors forfeited the right to seek capital punishment.
With a trial looming this past summer, Judge Andrew Siegel ruled that prosecutors couldn’t seek the death penalty because they had failed to give Melly and his attorneys proper notice that they planned to do so, violating strict state rules.
But in a ruling on Wednesday, Florida’s District Court of Appeal ruled the judge’s decision was incorrect. Since prosecutors gave notice that they might seek death when they first charged Melly in 2019, they had complied with state rules. “Notice is notice,” the court wrote in its opinion.
The ruling means that Melly could be sentenced to death if convicted in his upcoming trial. But that likely won’t take place until the Florida Supreme Court rules on the case, because Wednesday’s ruling certified the issue as one of “great public importance” that should be decided by the state high court.
In a statement to Billboard, Melly’s attorney Philip R. Horowitz said he and his client were “disappointed in the ruling” but “look forward to our opportunity to argue our position before the justices.”
The ruling came as Melly (real name Jamell Demons) continues to await trial on first-degree murder charges over accusations that he and another rapper shot and killed Anthony “YNW Sakchaser” Williams and Christopher “YNW Juvy” Thomas Jr. in 2018.
A trial had previously been scheduled for April, but was called off at the last minute, prompting Melly’s attorneys to file a so-called “speedy trial demand” that would require the case to start within 60 days. Another trial was then set for July, but the case was again delayed over the current dispute about the death penalty.
A first-degree murder defendant in Florida would typically face the possibility of execution if convicted, but Melly’s attorneys argued in April that the state had failed to comply with strict laws on how they must warn defendants that they’ll seek the death penalty.
Florida requires prosecutors to give notice 45 days after arraignment if they plan to seek capital punishment. In Melly’s case, the state attorney filed such notice when they originally indicted the rapper in 2019 but failed to do so when a so-called superseding indictment was handed down earlier this year.
In July, Judge Siegel sided with Melly’s attorneys and said prosecutors had forfeited the chance to seek death. But after prosecutors argued that the ruling was clearly incorrect, Judge Siegel acknowledged that his ruling addressed a novel legal question and halted the case until a state appeals court could rule on it.
On Wednesday, the District Court of Appeal did so – and sided decisively with prosecutors.
“We find that the state complied with its statutory obligations when it filed its notice of intent to seek the death penalty within 45 days of arraignment,” Judge Spencer D. Levine wrote for the appeals court. “The fact that the state filed a superseding indictment, requiring a second arraignment, does not vitiate the already filed and timely notice of intent. Notice is notice.”
The ruling said that rules were designed to give defendants a fair chance to prepare for a death penalty argument, and that prosecutors had lived up to that requirement with their original notice.
“Clearly, in the present case, the defendant was noticed and apprised of the state seeking the death penalty in 2019,” Judge Levine wrote. “The defendant has had nearly three years to start the preparation of his defense to the state seeking the death penalty [and] the record contains no evidence that the defendant was prejudiced in any way.”
Melly’s attorneys can appeal the ruling to the Florida Supreme Court.
Just two days after Condé Nast sued Drake and 21 Savage for using a fake cover story in Vogue magazine to promote their new album Her Loss, a federal judge has issued a restraining order forcing them to stop using it.
Siding with Condé, U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff ruled Wednesday that the faux cover – one of several fake promos for the album – was likely violating the publisher’s trademarks because Drake and 21 were “misleading consumers” and “deceiving the public.”
“Issuance of the requested temporary restraining order is in the public interest to protect the public against confusion, deception and mistake,” the New York federal judge wrote.
For the past week, Drake and 21 Savage have been on a phony media blitz to promote Her Loss, which debuted Friday. They dropped a video of a fake performance on Saturday Night Live, teased an a similar appearance on NPR’s Tiny Desk series, and created an elaborate deepfake interview with Howard Stern.
NPR used the stunt as an opportunity to tell the star he was “welcome anytime” on the beloved concert, and Stern laughed the whole thing off, but Condé Nast went a different route. In a lawsuit filed Monday, the publisher called the stunt a “flagrant infringement” its trademark, aimed at exploiting the “tremendous value that a cover feature in Vogue magazine carries” without actually securing one.
“All of this is false,” the publisher’s lawyers wrote, demanding an immediate injunction forcing Drake and 21 to cease all use of the “counterfeit” cover. “And none of it has been authorized by Condé Nast.”
The order issued Wednesday is what’s known as a temporary restraining order – a quick injunction designed to prevent “irreparable harm” that could not later be undone. A plaintiff like Condé can only win one if the judge decides that they are likely to eventually win their lawsuit.
Judge Rakoff’s order bars Drake and 21 from “using, displaying, dissenting or distributing” the fake cover or the actual phony Vogue copies they printed as part of the stunt. And it expressly requires them to take down websites and social media posts sharing the image, and to remove physical posters put up in certain markets.
Notably, it also explicitly requires them to stop making any mention of Vogue editor in chief Anna Wintour. In its lawsuit, Conde took particular aim at the fact that Drake had thanked her in his posts sharing the fake magazine cover, saying it had been “deliberately deceptive” to suggest that the infamous editor had endorsed the project.
Reps for Drake and 21 did not immediately return requests for comment on Wednesday’s order.
A temporary restraining order is, by its nature, temporary – lasting only until the parties have a chance to argue over a longer-term injunction. A hearing on such an injunction is set for Nov. 22.
Read the full order here:
A Los Angeles judge on Wednesday (Nov. 9) tossed out a lawsuit accusing Phoebe Bridgers of defaming producer Chris Nelson with a social media post echoing accusations of abuse made against him by another woman.
The judge cited California’s so-called anti-SLAPP law, which empowers courts to quickly dismiss lawsuits that might silence free speech. The star’s lawyers had argued that Nelson was just using the lawsuit to “chill Ms. Bridgers’ allegations of abusive conduct, which are protected by the First Amendment.”
The decision, issued by Judge Curtis A. Kin of the Los Angeles Superior Court, did not come with a written ruling explaining the judge’s rationale. An attorney for Nelson did not immediately return a request for comment.
In a statement to Billboard, a rep for Bridgers said: “We feel vindicated that the court recognized this lawsuit as frivolous and without merit. It was not grounded in law, or facts, but was filed with the sole intention of causing harm to our client’s reputation and career. This victory is important not just for our client but for all those she was seeking to protect by using her platform.”
Nelson sued Bridgers last year, claiming she had defamed him by posting false information to social media as part of a “vendetta to destroy plaintiff’s reputation.”
He pointed to a series of October 2020 Instagram posts, in which the singer said she had “witnessed and can personally verify much of the abuse (grooming, stealing, violence) perpetuated by Chris Nelson.” She also directed her followers to a separate thread from friend Emily Bannon, which contained more extensive allegations against Nelson.
Bridgers quickly moved to end the case, with her lawyers arguing that Nelson was trying to silence her allegations by dragging her through messy litigation: “It is clear that Mr. Nelson voluntarily and intentionally published his ‘amended’ complaint to the media before it was even filed in a transparent attempt to embarrass Ms. Bridgers and to get attention for his dispute with her.”
Faced with that motion, Nelson demanded the right to depose her — saying it was the only way he could prove that his allegation was valid. He said denying him that chance would violate his right to due process. A judge eventually agreed with him, ordering Bridgers to sit for questioning.
Kanye West is facing a copyright lawsuit over allegations that his “Life of the Party” illegally sampled a song by the pioneering rap group Boogie Down Productions – the latest in a string of such infringement case against the embattled rapper.
In a complaint filed Monday in New York federal court, Phase One Network (the group that owns Boogie Down’s copyrights) says Ye incorporated key aspects from the 1986 song “South Bronx” into “Life of the Party,” which was released in 2021 on West’s Stem Player streaming platform.
How do they know he did so? Phase One says West’s people reached out to clear the use of the Boogie Down song – and then released it anyway when a deal was never struck.
“The communications confirmed that ‘South Bronx’ had been incorporated into the infringing track even though West had yet to obtain such license,” Phase One’s lawyers wrote. “Despite the fact that final clearance for use of ‘South Bronx’ in the infringing track was never authorized, the infringing track wa nevertheless reproduced, sold, distributed, publicly performed and exploited.”
Amid his many, many other problems over the last year, West has been repeatedly sued for illegally sampling or interpolating in his tracks. In May, a Texas pastor named David P. Moten accused the rapper of sampling from his recorded sermon in “Come to Life.” In June he was sued again, that time for using a snippet of Marshall Jefferson’s 1986 house track “Move Your Body” in the song “Flowers.”
Though they’re coming at a faster clip in recent months, such lawsuits are nothing new for West. In 2019, he and Pusha T were sued for sampling George Jackson‘s “I Can’t Do Without You” on the track “Come Back Baby.” That same year, he was sued for allegedly using an audio snippet of a young girl praying in his 2016 song “Ultralight Beam.”
Further back, West was hit with similar cases over allegedly unlicensed samples used in “New Slaves,” “Bound 2,” “My Joy.” And thought he isn’t named in the case, Universal Music Group is currently facing a lawsuit that claims West used an initially-unlicensed sample of King Crimson’s 1969 “21st Century Schizoid Man” in his 2010 track “Power.”
In the new lawsuit, Phase One’s lawyers say West used an “exact reproduction” of “South Bronx,” featuring the song’s horn hits, a melodic figure and a drum fill. The company says it controls both the publishing and recording copyrights to the song, and accuses West of infringing both.
A spokesperson for West could not be located to comment on the new lawsuit. Multiple former press representatives for West have recently told Billboard that they no longer work with him.
Read the entire lawsuit here:
