They denounce Bad Bunny for the violation of copyright

In February 2023, EAZI, founder of the Fagica Africa record lab ‘Teach me to dance’ of the Puerto Rican star interpolated and sampled without permission ‘Empty My Pocket’ by Joeboy, a Nigerian artist from Fricue Father.

During the nine months after the launch of ‘A summer without you’, the album containing the theme, Eazi pressed without success to obtain due accreditation, without success. “The Aphric Fathera team has tried to resolve this issue in a friendly way since May last year with our mutual legal teams,” Eazi said in a statement. “But the intention of the Bad Bunny record company, Rimas Music, is clearly blatantly appropriating the work of young African creators for their benefit without attribution.”

Now, more than two years later, a demand before a federal court in Los Angeles On the part of the producer of ‘Empty My Pocket’, Dera, in which he alleges that Bad Bunny team continuously “hindered” attempts to give both Joeboy and dera the right credit. “It is not very common for a music artist to calibrate and the sophistication of Bad Bunny use the music of another person without permission, and then ignore that person’s efforts to solve the problem,” said Dera’s lawyer, Robert A. Jacobs. «Such an answer is especially surprising when unauthorized use permeates the entire work of the musical artist. Unfortunately, these are the circumstances in this case ».

Bad Bunny’s team argued that the exhibition was obtained with permission from Lakizo Entertainment, which at some point exercised as a song distributor. That caused a legal battle between Lakizo and Fagowa that caused the song to disappear from streaming services. But regardless of that, Dera’s demand affirms that Lakizo I had no freedom to authorize the sampling of ‘Empty My Pocket’.

“Despite the cooperation of the plaintiffs, these defendants gave them lengths after receiving the requested information, making it clear that the only option of the plaintiffs to obtain reparation for the violation of their rights would be through the courts,” say the lawyers of Dera.

In his demand, Dera says that Bad Bunny’s song was essentially built on his ‘Empty My Pocket’, and that the use is so “extensive” that the infringement of copyright is “unquestionable”: “The works of the plaintiffs understand practically the entire musical bed and a part of the letter in the offending recording and the infringing composition, and, as such, they represent a significant part of the attraction of the offending works ».

Published in 2022, ‘A summer without you’ was a global success, staying 13 weeks in the first position of Billboard 200 and more than 150 weeks on the album list. ” Teach me to dance ‘he stayed two weeks on the Hot 100 list and won 72 million visits on YouTube.