Jason Derulo took the witness stand in a Los Angeles federal courtroom on Thursday (April 30) to deny that a session musician on his 2020 chart-topper “Savage Love” deserves writing and production royalties.
Derulo and his label, Columbia Records, are defendants in an ongoing civil trial over the credits for “Savage Love,” a viral TikTok hit from August 2020 that later hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 thanks to a remix featuring BTS. The plaintiff is Matthew Spatola, a musician, songwriter and producer who played guitar and bass on the song.
Spatola alleges that he contributed key creative elements to the instrumentals on “Savage Love,” which sampled an earlier beat by New Zealand-born producer Jawsh 685. He’s now accusing Derulo of “cutting him out completely” from the lucrative royalties that would flow from writing and production credits.
Derulo, clad in a blue suit and grey tie, testified on Thursday that Spatola “played a beautiful guitar and bass” on “Savage Love.” But the pop singer told jurors he was the one who composed these instrumentals, and that Spatola just played what he was told.
“Mr. Spatola created absolutely nothing on ‘Savage Love,’” Derulo testified.
Derulo told the jury that he vets potential creative collaborators closely before deciding to work with them in a co-writer or producer capacity. He said that wasn’t the case with Spatola; according to Derulo, he had never even met Spatola before the musician came to his home recording studio for two sessions in April 2020.
“I would never in a million years just invite somebody off the street, that I’ve never heard what they’ve done, to come in and be a producer for me,” said Derulo.
The case, which was filed in 2023 and went to trial on April 22, highlights the prevalence — and potential pitfalls — of informal dealings between artists and their musical collaborators. It is undisputed that Spatola was paid a $2,000 fee for his work on “Savage Love.” But it’s also undisputed that he and Derulo never formally signed a so-called work-for-hire agreement.
Under copyright law, a work-for-hire agreement confirms that a musician does not have authorship rights despite contributing to a song. In this case, no such deal was signed; Derulo merely texted Spatola after the fact asking, “1K good each day?”
Spatola is now alleging that the absence of work-for-hire paperwork is proof that he deserves creative credits. Derulo disagrees — and now it’ll be up to a jury to decide which version of events is the truth.
Jurors are slated to begin deliberating on a verdict next week.
