Wiz Khalifa's accuser may have a tough time
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Wiz Khalifa.
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The most famous cases of copyright infringement in pop music have revolved around a distinct melody line.
In the most high profile case, a judge in 1976 deemed that George Harrison "subconsciously" lifted the melody of the Chiffons' 1963 "He's So Fine" for his 1970 hit "My Sweet Lord." More recently, in 2009, British rock band Coldplay settled out of court over a melody in "Viva la Vida" that Joe Satriani claimed was similar to his own "If I Could Fly."
In the case of Max Gregory Warren, a rap artist from Sharon, Mercer County, filing a suit against Pittsburgh-bred Wiz Khalifa, his label and songwriting partners, Mr. Warren is clearly playing the color card.
In a suit filed in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia on Dec. 30, he claims that Khalifa's multi-platinum, chart-topping, Grammy-nominated hit "Black and Yellow" is "substantially similar" to his 2008 song "Pink N Yellow." Other than talking about cars and jewels, which are common hip-hop themes, there's little similarity to the lyrics, the beat, even the melody of the chorus, until you hit the repetition of the words "and yellow."
Tom Kikta, assistant professor of music technology and guitar at Duquesne University, doesn't see enough there.
"You have two colors and they're associated, but what else do you have?" he says. "In 'Pink N Yellow,' there's no melodic line. He's just chanting it. If I sit here and play the melody on guitar, it's just one note. When Wiz Khalifa sings 'Black and Yellow' he goes G-A-B-flat-A, he actually has a melodic line. So what do you really have here? Just the word yellow? You can't have a chorus using the word 'Yellow'? You couldn't write 'Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Old Oak Tree'?"
"But there's no litmus test," he adds, saying that people file copyright suits, basically throwing it against the wall to see what a judge says.
First Published January 6, 2012 12:00 am
