Songs on Trial – Music Plagiarism in the Spotlight

Tuesday, 24 June 2025 00:05

From Led Zeppelin to Ed Sheeran, some of music’s biggest names have faced courtroom battles over where influence ends and plagiarism begins.

On this day - June 24, 2016, Led Zeppelin came out on top in a major copyright lawsuit that accused them of stealing the opening riff of “Stairway to Heaven”. A jury ruled the band did not copy the instrumental Taurus by the California group Spirit, saying the chord progression was not intrinsically similar and had been used in music for over 300 years.

It was a high-profile case in a long list of plagiarism battles in the music world—and one that reignited debate around where influence ends and copying begins.

Not every artist has been so lucky.

In 2015, Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams were found liable for infringing on Marvin Gaye’s “Got to Give It Up” with their massive hit “Blurred Lines”. Even though the two songs weren’t identical in melody or lyrics, the court sided with Gaye’s family, ruling that the feel and groove of Blurred Lines copied the original. Thicke and Williams were ordered to pay $5.3 million, setting a new precedent: that a musical vibe, not just notes and words, could be grounds for infringement.

That ruling sent a chill through the industry. If the general style of a song could be considered protected, would that shut down creativity?

Ed Sheeran faced the same question years later when he was sued over similarities between his hit “Thinking Out Loud” and Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On”. The case dragged on until 2023, when a jury ruled in Sheeran’s favor. He even brought his guitar to court to show how common the chord progression was. “If I’d done what I’m accused of doing, he said, I’d be quite an idiot to stand on a stage in front of 20,000 people and do it,” he testified.

Another case was quietly settled: Sam Smith’s 2014 ballad “Stay With Me” was found to share similarities with Tom Petty’s 1989 hit “I Won’t Back Down”.

Instead of going to trial, both parties settled by giving Tom Petty and co-writer Jeff Lynne 12.5% of the royalties and official songwriting credit. Petty later said he held no ill will, chalking it up to musical coincidence.

These cases show how blurry the lines can be when it comes to plagiarism. Sometimes it's a direct lift. Other times it’s about style, rhythm, or subconscious influence. Artists are walking a tightrope between paying homage and facing a lawsuit.

Even George Harrison, back in 1976, lost a famous case for subconsciously copying The Chiffons’ “He’s So Fine” in his hit “My Sweet Lord”. He paid over half a million dollars in damages.

And more recently, Katy Perry’s Dark Horse was the subject of a drawn-out legal fight with a Christian rapper named Flame, who said she copied elements of his song “Joyful Noise”. The court initially sided with the plaintiff, but the verdict was overturned in 2020 when an appeals court ruled that the musical elements weren’t original enough to be protected.

What these cases have in common is the growing tension between originality and inspiration. Music is full of shared DNA—chord progressions, grooves, lyrical themes—but when millions of dollars are on the line, the courts are forced to decide: was it influence, or was it theft?

And as artists keep creating, the debate over where creativity ends and copying begins is far from over.

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