A new ruling in a case concerning pop star Katy Perry could have a big impact moving forward.
Last week, an LA jury found Katy Perry guilty of copyright infringement for copying her 2013 No.1 hit ‘Dark Horse’ from a song by Christian rap artist, Flame. Marcus Tyrone Gray, who performs as ‘Flame’, initially brought action against Katy Perry and the five other producers of ‘Dark Horse’ in 2014, claiming that the hit had clearly plagiarised his gospel rap song ‘Joyful Noise’, which was released five years earlier.
Flame’s lawyers claimed that Katy and her co-producers had blatantly copied the beat and opening instrumental riff of Joyful Noise, which the rapper claimed was the ‘hook’ of the song, the memorable element which “catches the ear” of the listener. As required by US copyright law, they argued that circumstantial evidence showed a ‘striking similarity’ between the two works and Flame’s copyright had therefore been infringed.
The opposing lawyers denied all allegations, claiming that the beat of both songs was “commonplace” in the music world and as such could not be protected by copyright. One expert witness for the defence, a musicologist from New York University, told the court that the beat contained simplistic elements found in many songs including ‘Mary Had A Little Lamb’, which he proceeded to play live on piano in the court room.
Katy stressed that she hadn’t copied Joyful Noise as she had never even heard Flame’s track before the allegations. However, the Court rejected this claim. One District Judge claimed that Joyful Noise had “achieved critical success”, making reference to the fact that the song had over 3.6 million views on YouTube and was even nominated for a Grammy award. Flame’s lawyers further criticised Katy’s claim stating that the defence were “trying to shove Mr Gray into some gospel music alleyway that no one ever visits”. They also pointed out that Katy had similarly started out at a Christian music artist, so would have been more likely than most to be aware of Flame’s music.
Nevertheless, the court held that all 6 songwriters, including Katy, were liable for infringing the copyright in Flame’s track by reproducing its vital elements in Dark Horse. Even rapper Juicy J, who only contributed a single verse to the song, was held to owe damages as a contributory infringer. The court later awarded the gospel rapper $2.7 million in damages, with Katy herself ordered to pay $550,000 of this amount and her label, Capitol Records, covering the remainder. This will no doubt be a disappointing pay out for Flame, whose attorneys contended that he was owed in the region of $20 million. On the other hand, Katy’s lawyers claimed that whilst Dark Horse earned her $31 million, this only amounted to a $630,000 profit after costs. Katy’s legal team are preparing to appeal the decision.
This is not the first time we have seen high-profile pop stars taken to court over copyright infringement. Just last December, Ed Sheeran, Tim McGraw and Faith Hill were hit with a lawsuit in relation to their collaboration for the song ‘The Rest of Our Life’. Ed Sheeran is certainly no stranger to these claims, with his songs ‘Photograph’ and ‘Thinking Out Loud’ having also been the subject of copyright litigation in the past few years. With this recent influx in copyright claims, it will be interesting to see how widely the courts will be willing to interpret an infringement of copyright for musical works.
For more information please contact Amelia Oulton.
