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Bruno Mars facing second lawsuit over funky similarities

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Bruno Mars facing second lawsuit over funky similarities

Bruno Mars and his song-writing collaborator are facing another funky copyright infringement lawsuit. 

This time, the 1980s band Collage is claiming the Grammy award-winning song “Uptown Funk” sounds too much like their 1983 tune “Young Girls.” 

Performers Bruno Mars and Mark Ronson, along with their record labels and other collaborators, are named in the lawsuit, according to the Internet music news site Pitchfork.com. 

The complaint, which Pitchfork reviewed, states: “Upon information and belief, many of the main instrumental attributes and themes of ‘Uptown Funk’ are deliberately and clearly copied from ‘Young Girls,’ including, but not limited to, the distinct funky specifically noted and timed consistent guitar riffs present throughout the compositions, virtually if not identical bass notes and sequence, rhythm, structure, crescendo of horns and synthesizers rendering the compositions almost indistinguishable if played over each other and strikingly similar if played in consecutively.” 

The latest suit targeting the 2014 song is similar to one filed by The Gap Band last year, in which the vintage funk band was awarded songwriting credits after citing similarities between “Uptown Funk” and their 1979 hit “Oops Up Side Your Head.”

Earlier this year, another group claimed that “Uptown Funk” infringed on their song, too. The Sequence argued that Messrs. Mars and Ronson copied their 1979 song “Funk You Up.” The band, however, did not bring a lawsuit. 

 

 

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