Since it was released in 2015, the song Sorry has been a resounding success. The song has surpassed one billion views, and the work that contains it has received three platinum records in the United States. But there is also bad news.
According to the latest news, the singer Casey Dienel (whose stage name is White Hinterland) has accused the young Canadian artist of having plagiarized some fragments of a song of his. Dienel assures that Bieber has appropriated the "unique characteristics" of a song of his authorship, Ring The Bell.
Casey Dienel does not stay only in Justin Bieber, but extends his complaint to the producer Skrillex and the coaturoes of the subject, Julia Michaels, Justin Tranter and Michael Tucker. The controversy has arisen around an eight-second snippet, repeated six times throughout the song. But there is much more than the coincidence in the lyrics, as the singer assures that there are other similarities, such as "unique characteristics of the riff female vowel ', as well as synthesizers, samples, drums and percussion that Bieber would have, supposedly, plagiarized.
White Hinterland has ensured on his Facebook account that «Creating unique and original music is the passion of my life, but it is difficult and has consumed a lot of my time. I poured my blood, sweat and tears into writing and producing ring the bell (…) Throughout my career, I have worked hard to preserve my independence and creative control, so it was a surprise to hear my work used and exploited without permission. Bieber could have paid for the license to use it in Sorry, but chose not to contact me. After the launch, my attorneys sent him a letter, but Bieber's team chose to ignore me again. "
We have to remember that Justin Bieber already has precedents when it comes to plagiarism lawsuits. In 2010 he published the theme Somebody to Love, and two Virginia singers Devin Copeland, known as De Rico, and Mareio Overtonl, accused him of copying certain fragments of a song with the same name. The matter is awaiting trial, although the US federal appeals court has already stated that, in effect, there are very similar tones, chords and even parts of lyrics between the two subjects.