Given the long history of the music industry and the vast amount of recorded songs, it isn’t surprising that many musicians have been accused of plagiarism over the years. Artists like Ed Sheeran have recently gone to court over these issues, but some musicians settle out of court. Here are five musicians who have landed in trouble after being accused of plagiarism.
George Harrison
After The Beatles broke up, George Harrison became the first member of the band to get a No. 1 hit. The song “My Sweet Lord” brought him success but also drew comparisons to another popular song. It sounded remarkably similar to “He’s So Fine” by the Chiffons.
The song’s publisher agreed and, in 1971, sued Harrison for copyright infringement. In 1976, a judge ruled that Harrison had subconsciously copied the song. While he said he didn’t feel guilty, the case rattled him. According to his wife, Pattie Boyd, Harrison refused to listen to the radio afterward lest someone accuse him of plagiarism again.
“The judge found him guilty of ‘subconscious plagiarism,’” Boyd wrote in her book Wonderful Tonight. “After that we never had a radio playing in the house in case he was unconsciously influenced by a song he had heard.”
Dolly Parton
In 1980, Dolly Parton acted in her first film, 9 to 5. She wrote the catchy title track, which ultimately earned her an Oscar nomination. It also brought her legal trouble.
A couple, Neil and Jan Goldberg, filed a $1 million copyright infringement suit, claiming she stole from their song “Money World.” They alleged that Parton stole it after they sent it to her co-star, Jane Fonda.
“So degrading,” Parton said in an interview with Ladies’ Home Journal, per the book Dolly on Dolly: Interviews and Encounters with Dolly Parton. “One of the most painful things I’ve ever gone through. It damaged my reputation, I think, because there’ll always be people out there who think I would stoop so low as to steal from working people.”
Parton tried to settle out of court, but the Goldbergs insisted on bringing the case to trial. In the end, the jury determined that there were limited similarities between the songs and ruled in Parton’s favor. Still, the pain of being accused of plagiarism stuck with the musician.
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Johnny Cash
One of Johnny Cash’s better-known songs is “Folsom Prison Blues,” but the musician can’t claim credit for many aspects of the song. He took parts of the tune, title, and lyrics from the 1953 Gordon Jenkins song “Crescent City Blues.” In many ways, Cash didn’t even try to disguise the fact that he was borrowing from Jenkins’ song; both begin with the lyrics “I hear the train a-comin’/It’s rollin’ ’round the bend,” for example.
Cash settled with Jenkins after a lawsuit. Per the book Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison: The Making of a Masterpiece by Michael Streissguth, Jenkins’ son estimates the settlement was $75,000.
Led Zeppelin
In their time as a band, Led Zeppelin weathered multiple plagiarism lawsuits. They landed in hot — and expensive — water for stealing from Howlin’ Wolf’s song “Killing Floor,” Jake Holmes’ song “Dazed and Confused,” and Willie Dixon’s song “You Need Love.”
They also have faced plagiarism accusations for “Stairway to Heaven,” but the band has come out on top in this case.
Sam Smith
Sam Smith’s song “Stay With Me” was a massive hit in 2014, but it almost landed the musician in legal trouble. The publishers for Tom Petty’s song “I Won’t Back Down” reached out to Smith’s team about similarities between the tunes. Smith was happy to settle with Petty and Jeff Lynne, giving them 12.5% songwriting credit.
Petty was easygoing about the whole thing, noting that he never held any hard feelings toward Smith.
“About the Sam Smith thing. Let me say I have never had any hard feelings toward Sam,” Petty wrote, per Rolling Stone. “All my years of songwriting have shown me these things can happen. Most times you catch it before it gets out the studio door but in this case it got by. Sam’s people were very understanding of our predicament and we easily came to an agreement.”
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