California court allows Taylor Swift to shake off lawsuit
The US District Court for the Central District of California has dismissed (pdf) a copyright claim brought against singer Taylor Swift by songwriters Sean Hall and Nathan Butler.
Although the case has been dismissed, the plaintiffs have been given an opportunity to amend their complaint.
Hall and Butler filed a complaint in September 2017, alleging that Swift’s hit “ Shake it Off” copies lyrics and has a substantially similar sequence to the 2001 song “ Playas Gon’ Play”.
“Playas Gon’ Play”, sung by girl-group 3LW and created by Hall and Butler, contains the lyrics “Playas, they gonna play / And haters, they gonna hate”.
Swift’s song features the lyrics “Cause the players gonna play, play, play, play, play/And the haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate”.
Swift’s lawyers submitted a motion to dismiss the claim in early January and the court granted the motion on Monday, February 12.
The court found that because only two “brief phrases” in the songs are similar, and there are no allegations of any musical elements being copied, it was able to make its decision without the aid of musical experts.
“The allegedly infringed lyrics are short phrases that lack the modicum of originality and creativity required for copyright protection,” said the court.
District Judge Michael Fitzgerald noted that if any copying had taken place, it was only for the “unprotected” lyrics of “Playas Gon’ Play”.
In 2015, the same court dismissed a copyright infringement brought against Swift over “Shake it Off”.
Singer Jesse Braham had claimed that the hit had infringed the copyright to his “Haters Gone Hate” musical track, which was uploaded onto YouTube in 2013. Braham requested damages of $42 million.
Copyright infringement claims against musicians aren’t uncommon.
In November 2017, WIPR reported that a Chilean singer had sued Disney and singers Demi Lovato and Idina Menzel, alleging that the song “Let it Go” from the movie “Frozen” infringed his song “Volar”.
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