This one just got better and better as I started to look into it. After checking the Andrew Lloyd Webber Phantom of the Opera wikipedia page for some possible details it seems there are other examples. As I sit here and listen to Pink Floyd "Echoes" (1971) for the next 23 minutes (it's a really long song) I am going to check out these others and post them below.
In 1987, the heirs of Giacomo Puccini charged in a lawsuit that the climactic phrase in "Music of the Night" closely resembled a similar phrase in the sequence "Quello che tacete" from Puccini's opera Girl of the Golden West. The litigation was settled out of court for an undisclosed amount. In 1990, a Baltimore songwriter named Ray Repp filed a lawsuit alleging that the title song from Phantom was based on a song that he wrote in 1978 called "Till You." After eight years of litigation — including an unsuccessful countersuit by Lloyd Webber claiming that "Till You" was itself a plagiarism of "Close Every Door" from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat — the jury found in Lloyd Webber's favor. Roger Waters [of Pink Floyd] has repeatedly claimed in interviews that the signature descending/ascending half-tone chord progression from Phantom's title song was plagiarised from the bass line of a track on the Pink Floyd album Meddle called "Echoes." He has never taken any legal action ("Life's too long to bother with suing Andrew fucking Lloyd Webber"), but he did add an insulting reference to Lloyd Webber in his song "It's a Miracle": "We cower in our shelters/With our hands over our ears/Lloyd Webber's awful stuff/Runs for years and years and years/An earthquake hits the theatre/But the operetta lingers/Then the piano lid comes down/And breaks his fucking fingers. /It's a miracle!". source: wikipediaI also started to hum Weezer's Blue Album b-side "Susanne". Might be a stretch but I'm adding it anyway. "Phantom of the Opera Theme" Intro: [mini_player audio="/music/pink_floyd-echoes.mp3" artist="Pink Floyd" track="Echoes" year="1971"] [mini_player audio="/music/phantom-of-the-opera-theme-intro.mp3" artist="Andrew Lloyd Webber" track="Phantom of the Opera (Intro)" year="1986"] "Phantom of the Opera Theme" Verse: [mini_player audio="/music/ray_repp-till-you.mp3" artist="Ray Repp" track="Till You" year="1978"] [mini_player audio="/music/phantom-of-the-opera-theme.mp3" artist="Andrew Lloyd Webber" track="Phantom of the Opera (verse)" year="1986"] [mini_player audio="/music/weezer-susanne_bridge.mp3" artist="Weezer" track="Susanne" year="1994"] [mini_player audio="/music/train-50-ways_verse.mp3" artist="Train" track="50 Ways to Say Goodbye" year="2012"] I am not sure what Webber is talking about above but here is part of the Technicolor song: [mini_player audio="/music/joseph_technicolor-close-every-door.mp3" artist="Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" track="Close Every Door for Me" year="1982"] "Music of the Night" [mini_player audio="/music/phantom-of-the-opera-music-of-the-night.mp3" artist="Phantom of the Opera" track="Music of the Night" year="1986"] [mini_player audio="/music/puccini-girl-of-golden-west.mp3" artist="Giacomo Puccini (Daniele Barioni)" track="La Fanciulla del West (The Girl of the Golden West)" year="1910"] Bonus! Train vs. Train
And what's the deal with Train? Is it me or do these two choruses sound fairly similar?
[mini_player audio="/music/train-50-ways_chorus.mp3" artist="Train" track="50 Ways to Say Goodbye (chorus)" year="2012"]
[mini_player audio="/music/train-drive-by.mp3" artist="Train" track="Drive By" year="2012"]
Double Bonus!
Here is what a 23 minute Pink Floyd song looks like ("Echoes"):
More reading:
Andrew Lloyd Webber Testifies vs. Ray Repp in Copyright Suit on playbill.com
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WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And Train vs Train…LOL
I could give you offspring vs offspring,sum 41 vs sum 41 and even green day vs green day.
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I’ve got another: “Glycerine” by Bush (1994) verse (00:07) and chorus (00:59) sounds like “Time” by blink-182 (1993) intro (00:21) and “Anchors Aweigh” by Bouncing Souls (2003) chorus (00:16) and bridge (1:12)
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Another one: “Fashion Zombies” by The Aquabats (2005) intro sounds like “Up All Night” by blink-182 (2011) intro.
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For the “intro part” I’ve got two more you could use:
AC/DC – Big Balls
Cheap Trick – World’s Greatest Lover
The intro from both of them!
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so a song released in 1978 is plagiarized from a song released 4 years later in 1982?
Really?
in 1990, a Baltimore songwriter named Ray Repp filed a lawsuit alleging that the title song from Phantom was based on a song that he wrote in 1978 called “Till You.” After eight years of litigation — including an unsuccessful countersuit by Lloyd Webber claiming that “Till You” was itself a plagiarism of “Close Every Door” from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat — the jury found in Lloyd Webber’s favor.
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try this one out
carlos gardel: por una cabeza
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJ1aTPM-dyE
david fonseca: cry for love
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQU-Xn0dE6w
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Travis: No idea where Keith got 1982 from (copyright date? Cast recording? CD release?) but fairly sure Close Every Door was in the original Joseph in 1968
Another song with the descending semitones thing: You’re Alright by Michael Wookey
http://www.vimeo.com/10864259
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Keith Reply:
September 25th, 2012 at 3:36 pm
Yeah, sorry about that weird date. I wasn’t entirely sure when the Lloyd Webber version was originally recorded and how different, if so, the original version was.
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Keith Reply:
September 25th, 2012 at 3:36 pm
Good find on that other track too!
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“Pon De Floor” (2009) by Major Lazer and “Beat Of My Drum” (2011) by Nicola Roberts
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“California Gurls” (2010) by Katy Perry and “Turn Me Up” (2012) by Carly Rae Jepsen (I bet Dr. Luke produced “Turn Me Up” too)
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Songs on albums reprising earlier melodies happens a lot, it’s more in the tradition of opera or indeed musicals like Andrew Lloyd Webber (recycling Don’t Cry For Me Argentina endlessly in Evita) but James Blunt did it with You’re Beautiful.
thewaitisogre – I believe “Run the World”, and the Nicola Roberts track (which Madonna’s Gimme All Your Luvin’ famously sounded like with the cheerleader chants) all were authorized samples or had Diplo from the original on production.
Don’t forget Carly Rae Jepsen and Owl City’s “Good Time” being another total Cali Gurls wannabe – not produced by Dr. Luke apparently despite many assuming so, but some of his associates.
As for Andrew Lloyd Weber, he deserves a section of his own. This amusing hater video shows some of the many plagiarism cases he was involved in – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoVccXgAy6U
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Keith Reply:
October 1st, 2012 at 3:21 pm
Johnny, Thanks for the youtube link. Definitely an interesting piece!
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How do I listen to the songs?
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Keith Reply:
October 12th, 2012 at 4:11 pm
Hi, there should be small play buttons next to the tracks at the bottom of the post. They are currently HTML5 players so it is not perfect. What browser are you using?
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To make this even more longer, hear the start of “The Bells of Notre Dame” by the band Notre Dame..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zDRR37mkKw
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Mariah Carey – My All
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Keith Reply:
May 13th, 2013 at 7:35 pm
Woah. Nice find.
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