Miley Cyrus has been sued over her hit ‘Flowers’ after it was alleged that she and her co-writers copied parts of Bruno Mars’ song ‘When I Was Your Man’.
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The lawsuit – which was filed on Monday (September 16) in a Los Angeles court – sees a company named Tempo Music Investments claim that Cyrus’s Grammy-Award-winning song included an unauthorised “exploitation” of Mars’ 2013 track. Her co-writers, Gregory Hein and Michael Pollack, were also named in the suit, as well as Sony Music Publishing, Apple, Target, Walmart and other companies who were accused of distributing the track.
Mars is not named as a plaintiff as Tempo Music said that it owns a portion of ‘When I Was Your Man’ after they purchased it from the singer’s co-writer Philip Lawrence. The company is seeking yet-to-be-determined damages as well as demanding a court order that prohibits Cyrus from reproducing, distributing or publicly performing the song.
At the time of writing, Cyrus and her co-defendants have yet to respond to the suit. NME has reached out to both Cyrus’ and Mars’ representatives for comment.
The lawsuit claimed (as per Rolling Stone): “Any fan of Bruno Mars’ ‘When I Was Your Man’ knows that Miley Cyrus’ ‘Flowers’ did not achieve all of that success on its own. ‘Flowers’ duplicates numerous melodic, harmonic, and lyrical elements of ‘When I Was Your Man,’ including the melodic pitch design and sequence of the verse, the connecting bass-line, certain bars of the chorus, certain theatrical music elements, lyric elements, and specific chord progressions.”
It continued: “It is undeniable based on the combination and number of similarities between the two recordings that ‘Flowers’ would not exist without ‘When I Was Your Man,’” the complaint, which names Cyrus’ fellow songwriters Gregory Hein and Michael Pollack as co-defendants, continued. “With ‘Flowers,’ Cyrus, Hein, and Pollack have created a derivative work of ‘When I Was Your Man’ without authorization.”
Released in 2023 as the lead single from her eighth studio album ‘Endless Summer Vacation‘, ‘Flowers’ peaked at Number One on the UK Charts as well as the Billboard US Hot 100. It spent eight weeks at Number One in the US last year, and 10 weeks in the UK. ‘Flowers’ was the best-selling global single of 2023 and earned Cyrus two Grammys for Record Of The Year and Best Pop Solo Performance earlier this year.
In other news, Cyrus recently became the youngest-ever Disney Legend for her role as Hannah Montana. The company’s Hall Of Fame programme has previously inducted Harrison Ford, Jamie Lee Curtis, Angela Bassett, James Cameron and more.
Chappell Roan recently opened up about the impact that the ‘Wrecking Ball’ singer has had on her burgeoning career, sharing: “Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana tour with Jonas Brothers opening was my first concert ever. She came down in a box from the ceiling. I was like, ‘How do I do that one day?’ I still think about it. I still think about the show. I want to be like Hannah Montana.”
