Saturday, December 06, 2008

Is Coldplay's 'Viva la Vida' a rip-off?

Thanks to James Hyman for forwarding me this Utube link. Pretty convincing stuff, I'm afraid. So my bet is that this will cost Coldplay a lot of money as Viva la Vida does sound almost exactly like Joe Satriani's 'If I could fly'.



On the other hand, alternative band Creaky board also accused Coldplay of ripping off parts of Viva la vida from their track 'Songs I didn't write' (that title sounds almost like a piss-take of the situation, doesn't it?)

Creaky Boards later retracted the accusations and now speculate that both songs may have been inspired by the video game The Legend of Zelda (do you think they were given something to retract their claim?)

Click here to hear the comparison between those & more 'songs that sound like other songs'.

I actually believe that people do this stuff by accident. They start humming a melody they have heard somewhere, somehow & they think it's their own idea. It just has this 'familiar feel' to it (which is normally a good thing when you write a song). And- even when they aren't 100% sure that is an original idea- when they run it by other people and ask them if they've ever heard it before, those people all say no. Because the original is quite obscure. So, before you know it, you've ripped someone off. When you rip someone off knowingly, you make enough little changes to your song so no one can sue you (something Noel Galagher, for instance, is a star at ; )

Please tell me your verdict. Guilty or not?

7 Comments:

Anonymous said...

Not much of a Coldplay fan, but rip-off sounds a bit too harsh.

They never concealed their reinventions of existing songs, have they?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLGdLDLrJyw

Simone said...

Well, like I said in the blog posting, I don't think it was done intensionally. But the songs are pretty much identical.

So, whether it was done on purpose or not, the person who wrote the melody first should receive something, I think.

The fact is that neither songs (If I could fly & Songs I didn't write) were not huge hits and it took a band like Coldplay to turn this basic melody into a worldwide smash. So Coldplay deserve the success and the finances that come with that. But out of human decency, I would give some cash too to those who 'made up' that same melody before them too. That's all.

And, by the way, I do love Coldplay.

B-sting said...

I think not guilty. This happens a lot. Subconsciously or either by stupid accident. There are only so many notes a person can play before there's bout to be a sequence of notes that someone has played before.

In fact, I've noticed this by two of my own bands a lot. Someone plays a simple tune and I'll hear another familiar song in it. Often the person playing the tune doesn't even know the 'original' exists.

It gets really embarrassing when [url=http://archief.retecool.com/forum/threads.php?id=9731_0_24_0_C]a band plagiarizes itself[/url].

Eurodance Blog said...

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How are you can you listen this http://89.238.252.146:9000/listen.pls
It's a romanian dance floor radio not pirate it's from Bucharest .. it's not in dutch style but i think u like it ...

Best Regards!!

Tavi

Anonymous said...

It is their third wedding anniversary today.
Being married to her -
I wonder what it feels like.

Anonymous said...

You hurt your back while dancing?
I hope it is not serious.
Give us some more details, please.

Simone said...

Hi Kris,

Thank you for caring. How did you know that I hurt my back though?

It is rather pathetic, I'm afraid. I hurt my back whilst doing Zumba, which is this great South American dance/exercise style.

Apparently it was a build-up of the traveling (carrying suitcases, etc), my lack of exercise in the last 4 weeks & dancing like a lunatic without gradualy warming up. Oh well...you live, you learn.

It was pretty intense pain though. Couldn't walk the next day. I felt like I was 100 years old. Slowly getting better, but still feeling rather shitty.

I'm even missing out on two great parties! One tonight and possibly one tomorrow night (unless I feel much better by then)

And we're in the middle of moving house! Oh well...all this too shall pass. And I will be back to my bouncy old self again (I hope)