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I'm sympathetic to his situation, but he may be in danger of another lawsuit, this one with some merit. Unless he licensed it, he seems to have stolen almost t
by adrianmonk 4y ago
I'm sympathetic to his situation, but he may be in danger of another lawsuit, this one with some merit.
Unless he licensed it, he seems to have stolen almost the exact melody from the 1977 song "What a Difference You've Made in My Life"[1].
Here's the Ronnie Milsap version of "What a Difference...": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VNI0PylgV8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VNI0PylgV8
And here's Afroman's "Will You Help Me Repair My Gate": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oponIfu5L3Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oponIfu5L3Y
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[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_a_Difference_You%27ve_Made_in_My_Life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_a_Difference_You%27ve_Mad...
- fathyb 4y agoI believe this would be considered a parody, which doesn't require licensing.
- adrianmonk 4y agoDefinitely a good point. I hadn't even considered that it might have been intended that way. Lyrically, it has nothing in common. But I guess on a purely thematic level, he could be sarcastically implying they made a difference in his life. I'm not sure what is required to qualify as a parody, so maybe that's enough. ... EDIT: Based on one article I found, this might be satire (which isn't fair use) rather than parody (which is): https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/parody-vs-satire-in-copyright-law https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/parody-vs-satire-in-copyr...