Katy Perry has become one of the highest-paid celebrities in history since the release of her debut album ‘One of the Boys’ in 2008. After all, she has sold over 143 million records worldwide and has the most diamond-certified singles in the United States of any female artist on the globe. She also earns $25 million every year as a judge on American Idol.
Lawsuits are nothing new to Katy Perry. The “Teenage Dream” has engaged in a number of legal battles during her career. For instance, a man recently sued Katy and Orlando Bloom on the grounds that he allegedly sold them their Santa Barbara home while medicated. Perry also lost a $2.8 million copyright infringement lawsuit a few years ago involving one of her most popular songs.
Katy Perry paid $2.8 Million for this song due to copyright infringement
Katy Perry released the track ‘Dark Horse’ in September 2013 to promote her next album, Prism. By January 2014, the song had risen to the top of the Billboard 100 charts, where it stayed for a few weeks. Furthermore, the video for ‘Dark Horse’ was the most-watched music video on YouTube in the same year.
Things were going smoothly until Katy Perry, Capitol Records and every artist included in ‘Dark Horse’ were sued for copyright infringement. Marcus Gray, Emanuel Lambert and Chike Ojukwu, the plaintiffs, claimed that Perry’s song was a copy of their 2008 song ‘Joyful Noise.’ They claimed that the same short ostinato was used in both songs several times throughout the song and that Perry et al. stole the ostinato from “Joyful Noise” because it was a protectable original expression.
Perry, Dr. Luke, Max Martin, Cirkut, Sarah Hudson, Juicy J and Capitol Records representatives had to go to trial to defend themselves against these charges. However, the jury finally ruled that 22.5% of the profits from ‘Dark Horse’ were owed to ‘Joyful Noise.’
Perry had to pay the plaintiffs a little over $550,000 while her label, Capitol Records, had to pay roughly $1.3 million because Perry made about $2.5 million from this song. Perry’s five songwriting collaborators were also ordered to pay royalties based on the pay varying. So, for instance, producer Max Martin had to pay $253,000, but Dr. Luke had to pay $61,000 out of pocket and $189,000 for his company, Kasz Money Inc.
However, in 2019, Katy Perry, her record and collaborators were ordered to pay a musician $2.8 million in 2019 after he claimed the singer copied his song ‘Joyful Noise’ to make her hit track ‘Dark Horse.’ Perry, on the other hand, fought to have the decision overturned and actually won.