The usual culprit for clone songs are advertising companies. Not wanting to pay the original artist, but still use their funky tune, they usually resort to making something so similar to the original, you’d think it was the same song with a few notes out of place. It happened to Eminem, Sigur Rós, REM and now it seems The XX are the latest victim. Compare the following songs:
The song “Intro” by the XX, released in August 2009:
And this Hugo Boss commercial released in April 2014:
I’ve talked about clone songs before. Sometimes it’s obvious a clone song tries to rip off the original, but sometimes you can wonder whether it is meant as a tribute to the composers favourite music or simply that they didn’t even realise they were using a melody of their favourite artist. In the case of Shine a Little Light by Dutch artist Van Velzen it might be the latter. The song’s vocal line strikes a remarkable resemblance with Raise Your Hands by Bon Jovi. The most obvious clue there was no ill intention when writing the song is that in 2008 Van Velzen performed as the opening act for Bon Jovi (source in Dutch) when he performed in The Netherlands.
Last week there was some controversy concerning Eminem and sampling. While you expect the rap artist was being sued for lifting a sample and using it in his own song, it’s actually the other way round. He got cloned.
In 2002 Eminem released the song Lose Yourself as part of the soundtrack from the film 8 Mile in which he plays the lead character. Contrary to a lot of his other songs, the song uses no discernible samples from other music and is what is called ‘an original work’ under copyright laws.
In 2011, car company Chrystler licensed the song and used a reworked version of the song and got Eminem himself to act in an ad for their Chrystler 200 campaign. The slogan was ‘Imported from Detroit” and hints both on the origins of the car company and Eminem.
But then also in 2011, German car company Audi rolls out this ad for the Audi A6 Avant. Yep, they completely cloned Lose Yourself and used it in their ad. Notes were changed, arrangement were changed, but every one will recognise it as the same song. When I was writing this, the company that holds the copyrights to the song has decided to sue Audi. Chrystler was yet undecided.
It’s clear that Audi’s use of the song is intentional, though the launch of their ad while the one for Chrystler is out may be just a poor coincidence. Regardless, in the end this will probably produce more attention for both their products. There’s no such thing as bad publicity.
A special brand of clones are movie theme songs. Or more precisely sequel theme songs. Often film studios exploit a sequel as “the same film but with more explosions”, likewise they give the soundtrack the same treatment for a quick cash in. And like you try to keep the characters the same, you want to keep the audio backdrop the same and recognisable. Sampling, covering, a tribute and some times blatantly stealing become justified.
The most famous and often cloned song are obviously the James Bond opening songs. Don’t confuse these with John Barry’s James Bond theme song however, since this usually precedes the opening credits. No, the big epic songs by famous musicians usually have a distinct style that not only use the same instrumentation but often roughly the same build-up. Compare You Only Live Twice (1967) by Nancy Sinatra and The World Is Not Enough(1999) by Garbage for instance. It should be noted that, though performed by a wide range of artists, all of the recent themes are the work of composer David Arnold and the Bond films are heavily formula driven.
While the first Rocky film from 1976 has a signature theme song by Bill Conti (Gonna Fly Now), the band Survivor did the theme song for Rocky III in 1982; Eye of the Tiger. When Survivor got asked to also do the music to Rocky IV in 1985, the composed a similar song in composition and feel: Burning Heart. When the job of composing the soundtrack for Rocky V in 1990 came to some one else, the first thing you notice in the track by Joey B. Ellis is the fact that it indirectly samples Eye of the Tiger again in Go For It while the style of the track is very similar to The Power also from 1990 by Snap. Snap was also on the full soundtrack of Rocky V.
Like with Rocky, theme songs often get updated to fit the current popular style of music. When the original Ghostbusters film from 1984 got a sequel in 1989 with Ghostbusters II, the theme song from the original, Ray Parker jr.’s Ghostbusters, got a hiphop treatment by Run DMC also titled simply Ghostbusters. The original Mission: Impossible theme song to the 1960’s tv-show fitted perfectly in its time with the James Bond-style spy tune. When it got made into a film in the 1996, the Mission: Impossible themewas quickly adapted by U2’s Adam Clayton & Larry Mullen to a more electronic version. When Limp Bizkit got to do it in 2000 their song Take a Look Around again borrows from the original but with a totally different spin.
The list of example is endless. Feel free to comment about the ones you know, love or despise.
Sigur Rós get their fair share of requests for lending their musical for commercials, but they always say no. Yet, their music always pops up in these ads anyhow … as clone songs.
I’ve talked about clone songs; when artists copy the style and sound of a song without using the actual notes and lyrics, for quick financial gain because of instant-recognition by the audience. Taking that up a notch is when it’s not other artists borrowing the sound, but the same artist makes nearly the same song twice.
True, most artists have a recognisable ‘sound’. You can instantly recognise a U2 song, even when Bono isn’t singing. You might notice a gradual change in that sound making it easier to discern a song from the 80’s or 90’s. But most people will argue it’s not the same songs, unless you really hate the artist.
But some times when an artist scores one hit single, the pressure is on (usually from the record company) to replicate that success and as fast as possible too. In the rush, the same song that brought success earlier is grabbed, some notes are rearranged and some new lyrics are written and hey presto the new hit single that sounds very recognisable.
A very good example of this are Technotronic, because they didn’t do it just once but twice. Technotronic is a Belgian producer Jo Bogaert and an assortment of rappers who have lended their vocals for the tracks. In 1989 the hit Pump up the Jam came out of nowhere. For the video they used a girl to lip sync over Ya Kid K‘s vocals. Interestingly though a year before in 1988 one of the grand masters of house music, Farley Jackmaster Funk, released the track, The Acid Life. Undeniably, the music from Pump up the Jam is borrowed heavily from The Acid Life and should be considered ‘The Original’.
Since Pump up the Jam did so well, a string of single was released in 1990. The first two following Pump up the Jam were Get Up! and This Beat is Technotronic. If you listen to those three songs in sequence and ignore the lyrics, you notice the instrumentation, the buildup, nearly everything is identical. So much so, that there’s a video on YouTube that is labelled as Pump up the Jam but is ‘clearly’ Get Up! . And even though This Beat is Technotronic contains a male vocalist, you can still hear a female singer sing ‘Get Up’ in the song. Confusing innit?
With the track Spin That Wheel, there finally became some variation in the music, but Technotronic was now named Hi Tek 3 (same vocalists, same producer). When they went back to using Technotronic, they finally used a totally different sounding song: Rocking over the Beat (all still in 1990!). But by now, Technotronics triumph parade was over. Technotronic has kept releasing singles well until 2005, including a Megamix and a remix of their Greatest Hits every few years. Or should I say Greatest Hit?
Still, a lot of artist are considered one hit wonders. At least Technotronic became a one hit wonder with three songs, including this one: Technotronic – Pump up the Jam:
Today a real whodunnit mystery in the series The Origin of Samples that seems to be forgotten by the internet, judging by the fact I can find very little info about this minor scandal in the world of pop music.
In March 2003 R&B trio Mis-Teeq released the first single off their second album. The single was Scandalous (wiki) and was produced by the Stargate production team, who are also responsible for a ton of hits by Rihanna, Lindsey Lohan, Beyoncé and Ne-Yo. The song went on to become Mis-Teeq’s the biggest hit.
Also in March 2003, the final of the first Dutch edition of Idols is held. The contestant coming in second is Jim Bakkum, who then still used ‘Jim’ as his artist name. Despite being the loser, he is quickly signed to Wilde Productions (owned by Phil Wilde, one of the creators of 2Unlimited) and releases a a few singles and an album Impressed. In July 2003 he releases his second single This Love is Real on BMG records.
The song this Love Is Real is a cover of CB Milton‘s version of the song on his 1998 album From Here to There on Byte Records (owned by one of the men behind 2Unlimited: Jean-Paul De Coster). CB Milton got most famous for his songs Send me an Angel and It’s a Loving Thing produced by the guys behind 2Unlimited. CB Milton’s version was never released as a single, nor was the album it was on a major commercial success. The writers credited on the CB Milton version are Peter Bauwens and Phil Wilde of the production team Soundsational … and of Wilde Productions, the men behind 2Unlimited. On the Jim version Joey Balin is also credited as one of the writers, besides Wilde and Bauwens. If you listen to the CB Milton version, you’ll notice only the lyrics were covered.
If you listen to Scandalous and This Love is Real (by Jim), you’ll notice than other than a slight pitch change, the instrumentation is nearly identical. In fact, this mashup might convince you:
So it looks like not only are the lyrics not original in the Jim track, neither is the music. Then again, if the music industry wants to quickly push out a hit single for their newest star baby, I guess this is what happens. Now I do remember when this ‘scandal’ made it into the Dutch press back in 2003 someone did indeed find a link between the writers of both songs and that indeed someone had recycled some one’s idea, but nowhere on the web can I find a record of this. Tips are welcome. For now this remains a whodunnit ‘mis-teeq’ mystery.
All three tracks produced by the same producer and they line up perfectly. Of course this is nothing new, Linkin Park has gotten spanked for making the same song over and over again. Can you call it a clone song if it’s the same artist?
My father’s father often commented on my dad’s music that it was all ‘the same beat’. My dad has commented today’s music is all the same beat. Maybe it’s a sign I’m getting old that I’m noticing this too. But then again, when had pop music ever not been about recycling the same ideas over and over again? Right, Warhol?
I talked about clone songs a while back. There is yet another example from Dutch pop music that illustrates this point well.
Around 1998/1999 car-brand Mitsubishi aired a TV-commercial that featured music by a temporarily formed duo called City to City. The band name references to the fact that both band members (Maarten van Praag and Sandro van Breemen) have a city in their last name. Not only is their band name quite appropriate for a car commercial, so is their first and only hit single: The Road Ahead (Miles of the Unknown).
But if you listen to the song, the feeling creeps up on you, that you’ve heard this music before. Even the references to roads and cars somehow strike familiar. And you would be right. You might remember a video that (ironically) does not have a wide open road, but a traffic jam as its setting: R.E.M.‘s Everybody Hurts from 1993. Listen to both songs and you’ll notice: same instruments (especially the use of strings and percussion on the opening), same build-up, same mood, even almost the same melodies.
The single The Road Ahead topped the Dutch charts for 4 weeks and was #4 of best sold singles in 1999. The band City to City won the Edison (Dutch equivalent of a Grammy) for Best National Newcomer for that year. They released two more singles which failed to achieve any similar result, before City to City effectively split in 2002 when one of the two members left the band. The song The Road Ahead still shows up in the annual Top 2000 (best songs of all time list, compiled with votes from the listeners of Radio 2), usually somewhere between #500 and #900.
So far I’ve talked about covers, songs that have lifted parts of the lyrics or tune from other songs or songs that literally sampled a bit from another song. There is however another category of song: the clone. The clone is an almost literal, purposely made imitation of the original, to feel and sound the same as the original, but without using the exact same notes and lyrics to prevent copyright infringement.
Meet the song Save my Soul by a band called Superglue from 2000. You probably never heard of them, mainly because this was their only hit and only in the Netherlands. And even here it’s forgotten. It was used in an advertisement, for what, no one even remembers. Clones are often made especially for advertisements. All I can tell you it was sung by a guy called Edwin Meijster (who?) and it was written by him and a guy called Frank Pels in affiliation with EMI Music.
By now I hope you’ve listened to the link above (if not: do so) and recognised this song sounds a suspicious lot like a song from another band that used to be signed to EMI: Radiohead. In fact, if you put Karma Police (1997) next to it, the likeness is uncanny. And that was exactly the intention of Save my Soul. Less royalties to pay, same song. Even the band’s name might fool you into thinking it was Supergrass if you hadn’t paid attention.
By the way, if you want to hear a truly magnificent, but honest cover of Karma Police, I must again recommend The Easy Star All-Stars version of Karma Police from their Radiodread album. Besides making a full album of reggae Radiohead covers, they’ve also tackled Pink Floyd’s Dark side of the Moon and The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. But that’s another story.
Since EMI has disallowed embedding of the YouTube video for Radiohead’s Karma Police, instead I give you the Superglue song:
