All this over some flowers?
Miley Cyrus may be able to buy herself flowers, but she’s also now had to buy herself an attorney as well.
Cyrus’ release of Flowers in 2023 acted as a major milestone in her career – from child Disney star Hannah Montana to post-teen ball wrecker before blossoming into her latest phase in the form of album Latest Summer Vacation.
Alas, the widespread success of ‘Flowers’ – streamed more than two billion times on Spotify and seeing Cyrus land two Grammy Awards – was quickly followed by controversy – the accusation the song copied a Bruno Mars hit.
While Mars himself has not accused Cyrus of copying, a company that owns a share of the copyright of his song When I Was Your Man – Tempo Music Investments – filed a civil lawsuit against Cyrus back in September.
The lawsuit alleges Flowers would ‘not exist’ without having ‘exploited 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’.
When I Was Your Man was first released in 2013. For context, Mars sings: “I should’ve bought you flowers/And held your hand/Should’ve gave you all my hours/When I had the chance/Take you to every party/’Cause all you wanted to do was dance.”
And Cyrus sings in Flowers: “I can buy myself flowers/Write my name in the sand/Talk to myself for hours/Say things you don’t understand/I can take myself dancing/I can hold my own hand.”
However, on Wednesday (November 20), Cyrus’ legal team filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit in California’s Central District Court.
Tempo Music Investments owns part of the rights to the song as a result of acquiring the rights to songwriter Philip Lawrence’s catalog.
Cyrus’ lawyers argue the lawsuit should be dismissed because the company and lawsuit it’s filed subsequently only represent one of the four writers who worked on ‘When I Was Your Man’ – the other writers written by Mars, Ari Levine and Andrew Wyatt – and the Copyright Acts only permits ‘a legal or beneficial owner of an exclusive copyright’ to sue for infringement.
Cyrus’ attorneys also argue while the songs share ‘musical building blocks’ there are ‘striking differences in melody, chords, other musical elements and words’ between the two songs.
