Back in 2018, Lana Del Rey and Radiohead had gotten into a dispute over similarity in their songs, “Get Free” and “Creep.” And in 1990, Queen took Vanilla Ice to court for the similarities between “Under Pressure” and “Ice Ice Baby.” Artists are being taken to court and disputing about the composition and makeup of their songs.

Music is a very influential part of people’s lives. Many artists go under fire by the public and, most notably, other artists for their contributions to the music industry. With a lot of people expressing themselves through music it poses a discussion.

“I think it’s very silly that some musicians will take other musicians to court because their music is similar or they have a similar rhythm or lyrics,” sophomore Devan Nagy said.

There have been plenty of other claims over the years from one artist to the other. General makeup of songs and similarities between composition can get artists in plenty of trouble.

“It’s very stupid, they should have some better way to prove if they did or didn’t do it,” alumnus Joshua Markley said.

Though, some musicians get off easy in their cases, settling the dispute and not having to pay much or at all, like Del Rey, others do not. For example, the 1976 case of George Harrison’s “My Sweet Lord” and The Chiffons’ “He’s so Fine.” Harrison has had to give over one and a half million after being found guilty. And with Harrison’s song, it’s pretty noticeable .

“I feel like it’s reasonable to an extent if it’s close to an exact copy without permission from the original artist,” Nagy continued.

With cases, it’s left up to the court to decide the similarity. With so many elements left in open for free use, a song can use some of the same chords in a similar progression yet be a different, non-copyrightable song.

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