What is originality in music? How close does one song have to be to another for it to constitute a "ripoff"?

This is a question that a philosopher could sink their teeth into – but it's also one that concerns the law.

If you write a song, it's your intellectual property. If someone can be proven to have plagiarised it for commercial gain, you could have a case against them.

It's a pleasing irony that one of the most high-profile music plagiarism cases of modern times concerned a song called "Blurred Lines". While the odd open-and-shut case does exist, it can be very tricky to prove that someone has plagiarised from someone else.

In this article, we take a look at five famous music lawsuits – starting with a big news story.

Ed Sheeran vs Marvin Gaye

Ed Sheeran found himself the centre of a major court case that sought to prove that he had ripped off Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get It On".

The claim centred on the chords and rhythms of the two songs. Sheeran's lawyer, Ilene Farkas, told the jury that those similarities were "the letters of the alphabet of music… basic musical building blocks that songwriters now and forever must be free to use".

One writer for The Washington Post went so far as to say that the trial was a threat to Western civilisation, comparing it to a painter being sued for using a particular shade of red.

Sheeran and his record label Warner Music Group were being sued by the heirs of Gaye's co-writer Ed Townsend. Townsend's daughter Kathryn said they were doing so to protect her father's legacy.

After three hours of deliberation, the jury ruled that Sheeran wasn't liable for copyright infringement. He had previously said that he would quit the music industry altogether if he lost the case.

Radiohead vs Lana Del Rey

In 2017, American singer-songwriter Lana Del Rey released her number-one album Lust for Life. She claimed that British indie band Radiohead wanted 100% of the publishing rights to its closing song because of similarities to their 1992 hit "Creep".

Warner/Chappell (Radiohead's label) denied that a lawsuit was initiated, but acknowledged that they were in talks with Del Rey's people.

The claim revolved around the chords and melody of both songs. Musicologist Dan Bogosian has argued that "the entire verse is just Lana doing her lyrics over Radiohead's 'Creep'. She holds the same notes as Thom Yorke [Radiohead's lead singer] for the same duration at the same points."

If a lawsuit had ever been initiated, it could have put Radiohead in an awkward spot as "Creep" itself was the subject of a plagiarism case.

Radiohead was forced to give the writers behind The Hollies' "The Air That I Breathe" songwriting credits and some royalties because of similarities between the two songs.

Bob Dylan vs Hootie & the Blowfish

Bob Dylan is known as a musical magpie – or a plagiarist, if you ask Joni Mitchell. Nevertheless, the man behind "Love & Theft" sued American rock band Hootie & the Blowfish for its song "Only Wanna Be with You".

The bone of contention was lyrical. The Hootie song quotes several songs from Dylan's 1974 Blood on the Tracks LP – and even the singer adding "Ain't Bobby so cool?" didn't stop the legal action.

The band itself claims that the lawsuit was purely driven by greed and that Dylan's management only pursued the case when the song got big. It allegedly had no problem when the song was first released on an EP that sold only 50,000 copies.

Either way, Dylan got a one-off payment of $350,000 out of the band. This is different from the Radiohead vs Hollies case we mentioned, where the band was legally obliged to share a writing credit with the song they'd allegedly plagiarised.

George Harrison vs The Chiffons

In February 1981, George Harrison had to cough up just under $600,000 for plagiarising "He's So Fine" by sixties girl group The Chiffons.

Before the court case started, friends and listeners had pointed out the similarity between "He's So Fine" and Harrison's "My Sweet Lord" – a song in praise of the Hindu god Krishna.

Harrison admitted to the similarity but said it was purely subconscious. "Why didn't I realise?" he wrote in his memoir I Me Mine. "It would have been very easy to change a note here or there, and not affect the feeling of the record."

Two years after the case was started in 1971, Harrison agreed to pay 40% of the song's royalties to the Bright Tunes publishing company. But things didn't end there.

Former Beatles manager Allen Klein made an offer to buy Bright Tunes. Klein had been fired by The Beatles and now, as head of Bright Tunes, decided to resume legal action in February 1976.

The judge ruled that Harrison had subconsciously copied the song in September of that year – but it took another five years for the court to decide how much Harrison owed. In 1981, he paid $587,000.

Even then, the case dragged on until 1998. Despite this high-profile lawsuit, Harrison said that he never regretted writing the song.

Oasis vs The New Seekers

Finally, Oasis was successfully sued for plagiarising the New Seekers' song "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing" – a track made famous in a 1971 Coke commercial.

The Oasis song "Shakermaker" began with an outright lift from the earlier song – "I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony." Because these lyrics were copyrighted, Oasis had to change them to "I'd like to be somebody else, and not know where I've been."

Noel Gallagher said that the borrowing was ironic – and also claimed that the band now sticks to Pepsi.

Are you looking for guidance on intellectual property law? At Milners, we provide expert, no-nonsense advice at affordable rates. Interested? Then get in touch for a free, no-obligation consultation.