Songs that Sound Suspiciously Like Other Songs!
 

We've all heard a few in our time. Now it's time to compile the ultimate list of musical robbery (be it accidental or just plain cheeky)

Ever notice that AC/DC's "Anything Goes" sounds eerily similar to "Born in the U.S.A" by Bruce Springsteen?

Or that Audioslave's "Cochise" reminds you of Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lotta Love"?

When Good Charlotte were writing "Beautiful Place" it's pretty obvious they were listenning to Coldplay's "Don't Panic" at the time and forgot that those lyrics already existed...

And when Guns n' Roses were thinking up "Paradise City" they maybe didn't have time to think of a riff and so borrowed one instead from Black Sabbath's "Zero the Hero"

But it's not like Sabbath are innocent either, subtly nicking the riff from Zeppelin's "Communication Breakdown" to make their sleeper hit "Paranoid"

Shame on M.I.A for making "Paper Planes" a rip off of the intro to "Straight to Hell" by The Clash!

know any more?

I don't think M.I.A. ripped off the Clash. She sampled them. There's a difference.

A rip-off artist would be Lady GaGa, who has ripped off Madonna and Ace of Base.

fair point

What's the Ace of Base comparison?

A pretty obvious choice but the only big one I can think off the top of my head.



Sounds suspiciously like this



Apparently the bands managers got into a pissing match and there was a lawsuit in the works but it was dropped after Cobain offed himself.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Definitely. I loved Ace of Base when I was a kid.

They were one of the few dance acts that didn't just let some producer write all their stuff and make all of their beats. Aside from the occasional cover, they did it all themselves.

and



Almost identical choruses.

Love that one Pete. Not heard that track before (or at least I can;t remember it).

I always thought that "Why Don't You Get A Job" by the Offspring sounded an awful lot like "Ob La Di Ob La Da" by the Beatles.

MUSE-STARLIGHT

ABC-ALL OF MY DREAMS

These two songs melody wise sound almost exact. I'm surprised ABC never called them on it honestly.

The Killers:



Is the biggest rip-off of Road to Nowhere:

You know what would be really funny, if for some reason Nickelback got ahold of time travel technology and Nickelback 2001 sued Nickelback 2003 for plagiarism and then somehow caused some kind of paradox which erased them from the space time continuum.

Why can't they just use it to go back in time and never form a band at all?

Oh yeah, I know what you mean.

One that comes to mind is when Red Hot Chili Peppers put out Stadium Arcadium, a medium uproar sounded about Dani California being a rip off of Tom Petty's Last Dance With Mary Jane. Tom Petty eventually had to call off the hounds and explain it's just a nice sounding chord progression, nothing intricate, etc. and that he had nothing against the Pepper's tune.

i always thought that Queen's "Breakthru" and Don Henley's "Boys of Summer" sounded very similar

Heh. That's probably because he himself was accused of ripping off "Last Dance With Mary Jane" from this song:

Or even better, the members of what would be Nickelback in '95 kill themselves because of a vision they had of being one of the worst bands in existence.

boy i really hope Chad Kroeger doesn't have a MusicBanter account...=/ could get a tad awkward

Yeah, wouldn't want him learning something useful or beneficial about music. That'd be horrible.

haha. nice

Totally forgot about how Led Zeppelin ripped off so many songs without crediting the original writers properly.

Geez! Listening to one Nickelback song is hard enough, but two! At the same time!? Just awful

Shakira's "Underneath your clothes"



Sounds suspiciously like the Bangles "Eternal Flame".

The main riff in Papa Roach's "Last Resort" is taken directly from "Genghis Khan" by Iron Maiden. It's not even changed at all. They just stole it.

That's interesting. I had never heard that before so I just went and listened to the Maiden song. I certainly hear what you're talking about but saying "it's not even changed at all" is misleading. They are very similar, but not identical, and they are used completely differently in the context of their respective songs.

For anyone who wants to hear what we're talking about, here's the Papa Roach song:



and here's the Iron Maiden song (the riff in question starts at 1:46):

Both are incredibly similar, for some reason I quite like them both though:





Very generic chord sequence, but they both cheer me up equally.

Mc Hammer's Can't Touch This was a copy of Rick James's Superfreak. It is sadly too obvious.


Apparently some of my friends think Madilu System's Nzele is a direct copycat of Tabu Ley's Nzale. Although they have similiar rhythm, but the subject is entirely different. Well, you make the judgement.


My dad hates this cool Zimbabwe song because he thinks it is a ripoff of my idol Franco's classic SADOU. Although the sounding is similiar but the guitars are so damn different.

I have posted this before but it always deserves another posting:


A full two years before this:

Mmmmm, I think MC Hammer actually intended to sample Superfreak, as an homage as opposed to a rip-off. I think he was well-intentioned enough in that regard, and he did it with some creativity. But it seems like every time rap and dance music is in the spotlight, there's usually an attempt to modernize past hits by 'reinventing' them. So in a way, it still comes across like a ripoff, since they usually take the praise for it anyway. Some people seriously think that Karl Wolf wrote "Africa", that Flo Rida wrote "Right Round," and that the Black Eyed Peas wrote "Time of my Life". The charts have become an 80s hit parade.

Check out the Cure's Letter to Elise and Bon Jovi's Never say goodbye. Robert! Robert! Robert! What were you thinking? I wonder if one of the waifs and strays that end up in the Cure from time to time brought the tune in and Robert Smith obviously no great expert on Bon Jovi's recorded output didn't know. A/w it's rarely been perfomed since the Wish album days which might be because of the blatant plagiarism. I've taken if off my Wish spotify playlist.

Some lamebrain judge in the 70's swore The Chiffon's 'He's So Fine' was plagiarized by George Harrison's 'My Sweet Lord.' Come on. What was he on?

Paul McCartney & Wings - Magneto and Titanium Man



and

Belle & Sebastian - The Boy With the Arab Strap

The Beatles - For No One



Harry Nilsson - Mournin' Glory Story

Both great tunes, though.

Horace Silver - Song For My Father



Steely Dan - Rikki Don't Lose That Number

Omg thank you for posting this! I've been trying for months to find the song that has that same intro has Rikki Don't Lose That Number but I couldn't for the life of me remember what it was.

Read about this on the 'net -- the similarity is striking, although I tend to give Neil the benefit of the doubt as Carole's song was an early Brill Building demo.

Carole King - He's a Bad Boy



Neil Young - Pocahontas