Everyone has heard of the band One Direction. Even yours truly, who rarely listens to music anymore. But I heard One Direction’s “Midnight Memories” on late night TV a couple of weeks ago and you could have knocked me over with a feather. Parts of it sound incredibly similar to Def Leppard’s “Pour Some Sugar on Me.”
Draw your own conclusions. I happen to be an old Def Lep fan, and to me One Direction is just another boy band imitating (plagiarizing?) real rockers.
That said, Def Lep has shown what a class act they are. They have grounds for a nasty plagiarism suit but decided to take the “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery” route and drop the matter.
Said Def Lep’s Vivian Campbell:
“The chords are one-four-five. Those are the blues. You don’t get more basic than that. I think what’s more reminiscent of the LEPPARD thing is the production, the sound, the vocals, the reverb and the way it’s assembled. That is very flattering that all of a sudden these kids think it’s a cool sound. I think a lot of people of their generation aren’t going to connect their music to ours.”
One Direction might not like being dissed as “these kids,” but they caught a real break on this one. I hope they know that.
Frankly PT, I’m not sure I’ve heard of One Direction. I know that song doesn’t ring any bells. With any luck though, the controversy will draw attention to the great music it’s imitating! 😀
Obviously that’s the way Def Lep sees it. Great music is great music. On the other hand, I can’t imagine a bunch of shrieking prepubescent girls ever swooning over our favorite ’80s rockers.
(and you were kind not to mention the egregious typo in my headline that I just corrected)
It’s a good thing I never like that song then –One Directions, Midnight Memories– otherwise I would have been disappointed. I like to think that the people who are getting paid the big bucks, from all their fans, at least go out of their way to be original in their music. On the other hand though, it’s hard to really blame them, Selena Gomez said it best, “every beautiful song has already been written.” I’m no song writer, but I understand how hard that can be.
Anyway, I agree with Izaakmak, it will bring attention back to the original song; which is always good. Unfortunately though, I happen to be one of those prepubescent girls who will probably never be able to truly appreciate the music from back in the day.
Whatever the case may be, thanks for sharing this post with us — you’ve got a new follower — I’m new around here, wordpress.com, and I’m just rummaging around and trying to make friends and stuff. I can’t wait to read your future posts!
Back in some of my writing classes, and in other areas too, we were taught that there’s really nothing new under the sun. There are only so many basic plots (seven, according to one instructor), only so many possible combinations of musical notes, etc. There’s even a theory that if you give a monkey a typewriter and enough time, he will, sooner or later, produce a novel.
No, I wouldn’t expect today’s young people to embrace the music of their parents any more than I did. Except perhaps for the Beatles. They seem to be transgenerational (is that a word?).
Thanks for following and commenting. I look forward to seeing you again.
You’re asking me? I have no clue if 90% of my vocabulary is a word, ahaha.
And I completely agree with what you’re saying.
There are days I think half the vocabulary of today’s kids is made up of gibberish. Texting is destroying the English language! 😉
I try to text all the words out, and I use big monster words sometimes 😉
Outstanding! You make this old editor smile. 🙂
One Direction means nothing to me because I’m old … lol 😀 I’m impressed with the gracious position Def Leppard took as I remember their music. I was never a shrieking prepubescent rocker and was astonished when I saw others swoon for the first time and that was the response to the Beatles.
You know TT, it was the “shrieking prepubescent” reaction to The Beatles that kept me from appreciating their music until just before they broke up… 🙄
I was a huge Beatles fan, but I was a sophomore in college when they hit the US. Much too sophisticated to shriek … 😉
I was only about 8 or 9 when all the rage began. As I was going through my “Dracula” phase, about all they did for me was provide the mental music to go with my “I want to bite your neh, eh, eh, eh, eck!” 😳
I didn’t have a Dracula phase, either. Guess I was a pretty boring girl.
I was never a shrieking prepubescent either. That’s one behavior I’ve never understood, even though it’s been around since before I was born. Hmm, I wonder if my mother was a shrieker … heh, that would have been a sight!