Patent Law

"Velvet Revolver" settles plagiarism of "Voodoo Six"

By Lawrence B. Ebert, Esq.

Rock supergroup VELVET REVOLVER have agreed to hand over a fifth of all the royalties from their 2004 album CONTRABAND after learning the riff to their PRETTY LITTLE THING hit was stolen.

Voodoo Six star Tony Newton called on his publishers to fight for a deal after hearing the song for the first time and realising it was a copy of his Dirty Little Thing tune - but even he never expected the matter to be settled so quietly and quickly.
He says, "When I checked it out (the song), I genuinely couldn?t believe it, because it wasn?t as if it was close? It was basically the same riff.

"I called my publishers to check whether they knew anything, which, of course, they didn?t, and then basically left it with them. I never really expected to hear any more about it and was as surprised as anyone when I heard that Universal had settled with Velvet Revolver.?

According to Newton, the settlement not only secures him a windfall; he'll also receive all future royalties from digital, live and commercial uses of the song.

Nobody recognizes plagiarism quite like the plagiarized author (as here, or in the Andersonville Civil War mess) or like someone on a mission (the Glen Poshard matter). Of course, sometimes your digital music player discovers plagiarism too; wonder if that would have worked in the Velvet Revolver matter [?] Perhaps some IT companies should take a lesson from Velvet Revolver when patent infringement comes up.

[IPBiz post 4137]

Full post as published by IPBiz on August 20, 2008 (boomark / email).