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31 October 2016Copyright

Bruno Mars and Mark Ronson sued over ‘Uptown Funk’ infringement

Singer Bruno Mars and record producer Mark Ronson have been named in a copyright infringement lawsuit centring on their hit song “Uptown Funk”.

The suit was filed at the US District Court for the Central District of California on Friday, October 28 by Yours, Mine & Ours Music and the estates of Grady Wilkins and Lee Peters.

Wilkins and Peters were members of 1980s electro-funk band Collage. In 1983, Collage released an album called “Get In Touch”, which featured the song  “Young Girls”.

In the suit, the estates of Wilkins and Peters, who are both deceased, argued that Mars and Ronson’s song “Uptown Funk” infringed their copyright.

“Uptown Funk” featured on Ronson’s album “Uptown Special”, which was released last year.

The complainants have asked for declaratory and injunctive relief.

“Young Girls” was registered at the US Copyright Office in July 1983.

Wilkins and Peters transferred a “portion” of their copyright in a co-publishing deal with music publishing companies Yours, Mine & Ours Music and Spectrum VII. Spectrum VII had the right to “administer copyrights” that were created by writers at Yours, Mine & Ours Music.

“Young Girls” is still subject to the co-publishing deal, the complaint said.

Other defendants named in the suit include Sony Music Entertainment, Warner/Chappell Music and Atlantic Recording Corporation.

The suit said that Ronson and Mars’ song “is an obvious, strikingly and substantially similar copy of plaintiffs’ original composition”.

“Uptown Funk” had sold more than six million copies as of July 2016 and is the ninth video to have more than one billion views on YouTube, according to the suit.

In addition, the estates of Wilkins and Peters said that Mars and Ronson’s copying is “so blatant, clear and explicit so as to only be reasonably characterised even by a lay-person in the first several seconds as ‘strikingly similar’ in rhythm, harmony, melody, structure, nature”.

The estates of Wilkins and Peters are asking for costs, punitive damages, attorneys’ fees and a trial by jury.

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