Now comes hip hop onto the scene, and what went from rapping a
bout real life issues throughout the 1970s and 80s soon turned into only rapping about sex, drugs, pimpin’, and violence. The new millennium also brought sampling into the hip hop industry, where an artist uses something from another artist’s song (a legal example being MC Hammer using the background music from Rick James’s Superfreak in Can’t Touch This).Hip hop has become a copyright infringement zoo, and Dr. Dre, Mary J. Blige and Eve contriubute even more to this trend in their song, Not Today, used in the Barbershop 2 soundtrack, by obviously ripping of Madonna’s 1983 smash hit, Holiday.
Vs.
Notice that the beat is exactly the same? It’s especially noticeable though the chorus. Now, the Copyright Act clearly states that an artist may sample 10% or 30 seconds from another song, whatever is less. But this 4 minute 16 second song definitely violates this rule.
New York MusicServices, musicologist, Judith Finell [1] was called to the court to be an expert witness on copyright infringement . "Both the pitches and the rhythms sound closely related," Finell told the press. "I don't think they're identical, because Madonna's song is in what we call 'major key' and Mary J Blige's song is in a minor key." [2] I would think that a producer as great as Dr. Dre wouldn’t let something like this happen. But this was obviously a sampling gone too far.
Vs.
Notice that the beat is exactly the same? It’s especially noticeable though the chorus. Now, the Copyright Act clearly states that an artist may sample 10% or 30 seconds from another song, whatever is less. But this 4 minute 16 second song definitely violates this rule.
New York MusicServices, musicologist, Judith Finell [1] was called to the court to be an expert witness on copyright infringement . "Both the pitches and the rhythms sound closely related," Finell told the press. "I don't think they're identical, because Madonna's song is in what we call 'major key' and Mary J Blige's song is in a minor key." [2] I would think that a producer as great as Dr. Dre wouldn’t let something like this happen. But this was obviously a sampling gone too far.
When I take a look at the music industry and how artists treat copyright infringement laws, it looks like such a joke. The artists that take the obvious shots at other people’s work are always rich enough to pay the fine that’s charged to them (for example, Dr. Dre, Mary J. Blige, and Eve...three of the most successful artists in the hip hop industry...). Madonna’s publishing company may have been suing for $15million, which looks like a huge sum. But even if the three hip hop stars couldn’t afford that, they’re each successful enough that they could’ve pooled their money together to have enough to pay the fine. Also, the $15 million probably didn’t mean too much to the Madonna empire in the long run anyway, since that’s a multi-billion dollar business in itself. I can hardly even call music art these days, what with artists “sampling” others to credit it as their own. It’s totally unfair.
[1] MusicServices Inc. “Judith Finell: MusicServices Inc.” <http://www.jfmusicservices.com/>
[2] Dave. “Madonna sues Dre, Eve and Mary J Blige.” Rap Basement: Hip Hop Lifestyle Network. <
[1] MusicServices Inc. “Judith Finell: MusicServices Inc.” <http://www.jfmusicservices.com/>
[2] Dave. “Madonna sues Dre, Eve and Mary J Blige.” Rap Basement: Hip Hop Lifestyle Network. <
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