Last December, instrumental rock guitarist Joe Satriani brought a lawsuit against Coldplay over their wildly famous hit “Viva La Vida.” Satriani attested that the melody of the song had been taken directly from his tune “If I Could Fly.” In fact, Satriani wasn’t the only big name to accuse Coldplay of thievery; Cat Stevens also suggested to the media that the super group had plagiarized portions of his work. Satriani settled his suit out of court just over a week ago (presumably for a hefty sum), while Stevens asked for his compensation to come in the form of “a cup of tea with them.” In both cases, Coldplay front man Chris Martin insisted that the band wrote the song entirely on their own.
But would it really have been so bad if they hadn’t? After all, artists’ influences always seem to show through in their songs, and the old adage tells us that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Of course, imitation bordering on plagiarism tends to bring up an abundance of red flags, especially here on a college campus. We are all heavily cautioned by professors and administrators alike not to take the Chris Martin path when it comes to term papers, and for good reason. In the realm of the arts, however, it’s worth noting that matters such as this should be looked at in their own little light.
Consider the aptly named “mash-up” music that is so widely endorsed across campuses and club scenes today. Mash-up artists, for those unaware, create songs by digitally piecing together fragments of the works of other artists and weaving them into something of an aural collage. The movement is of ambiguous legal status for obvious reasons, yet is seldom looked down upon for such. On the contrary, the music is celebrated and widely consumed, just like the commercial culture of hip-hop sampling from which it spawned.
The offenses here, save for those paying royalties, are far more obvious than those of Chris Martin and Coldplay. This is no recent development, though, as this type of pilfering can be traced a pretty considerable way back.
It has been suggested, and reasonably substantiated, that Shakespeare himself wasn’t quite the mastermind we’ve made him out to be. Now, that’s not to take anything at all away from his prose or prolificacy as a playwright or poet. It merely means that not all of his plots were, in fact, his. Many of his works mirrored very closely the tales told by those who came before him, and those of us more well read than this columnist could point you directly to those tales.
Even in light of this, the Bard is no less extraordinary in our eyes. He is still the best there ever was, regardless of the fact that he may have borrowed a storyline here or there.
This is nothing new, and in no way a profundity. Everyone knows that Gregg Gillis of Girl Talk didn’t record any of the music he puts out (Gillis doesn’t even have the legal rights to the music he uses). If these instances are so much more blatant than the trial-inducing tunes of Coldplay, why, then, do we let them go without so much as a lawsuit?
The answer, in this case, is a relatively simple one. It’s because they’re good. People like them. Sure, Shakespeare wrote some stories that someone else had already put down on paper. For one thing, he was writing at a time when nuisances such as copyright laws didn’t exist, but that’s not the point. The point is that he took those old stories and wrote them better than anyone else did, and so all sins are forgiven.
As for Gillis and the rest of the mash-up movement, corporate law has yet to put an end to the music. Perhaps this too is for no reason other than its widespread popularity. Some herald this musical phenomenon as somewhat of a cultural revolution, while most are more or less content to just enjoy it for what it is. But the reason it doesn’t go to trial in our minds is because it is realized to be something new in the way of the arts. Something new built from something old, just like Shakespeare’s stories.
It’s like Picasso may or may not have said: Good artists imitate, but great artists steal. Most grant Shakespeare his greatness and, depending on your point of view, Girl Talk might be up there as well. If that’s the case, then it looks like Satriani and Stevens just may have given Coldplay the biggest compliment in the book.
Chris Bassil is a Trinity sophomore. His column runs every other Wednesday.
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