Kanye West sued by pastor over sermon sample
Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, has been sued by a Texas pastor for allegedly sampling his sermon on the 2021 track “Come to Life”, without consent.
Bishop David Motten filed the lawsuit against West and his associated record labels Def Jam Recordings, Universal Music Group and GOOD Music in Dallas federal court on Tuesday, April 3.
The track, which appeared on the rappers’ 2021 album “Donda” contains “repeated, unauthorised, unlicensed samples from the sound recording of a sermon” delivered by Motten, the complaint alleges.
Motten claims that this is the latest in an “alarming pattern and practice” of “willfully and egregiously sampling sound recordings… without consent or permission” on the part of the rapper.
The complaint accuses West of violating Motten’s common-law copyright by incorporating “loops underscoring the pre-chorus and chorus” of the sermon in at least 20% of the track, which runs for a total of five minutes and ten seconds.
Motten also claims that West “reaped tremendous financial and other benefits” from utilising the sample and therefore argued that the rapper had been “unjustly enriched by wrongfully deriving profits” from the pastor.
The complaint asks the US District Court for the Northern District of Texas for a jury trial on all claims as well as damages from West for the infringement.
Sample suits
This lawsuit comes a week after news surfaced that the artist had been embroiled in an ongoing dispute with the prog-rock band King Crimson over the sampling of their song “21st Century Schizoid Man” in his 2010 single “Power”.
The song was the lead single for West’s acclaimed album “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy”, which was released by Def Jam Recordings and the now-defunct Roc-A-Fella Records in November 2010.
King Crimson’s founder Robert Fripp said that the dispute “has been dragging on for several years, unnecessarily” after the two artists could not reach a licensing agreement for fair royalty payments.
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