{"id":8150,"date":"2025-10-11T15:15:40","date_gmt":"2025-10-11T15:15:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/taylor-swift-wood-song-copy-debate-charlie-puth-talks-interpolation\/"},"modified":"2025-10-11T15:15:40","modified_gmt":"2025-10-11T15:15:40","slug":"taylor-swift-wood-song-copy-debate-charlie-puth-talks-interpolation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/taylor-swift-wood-song-copy-debate-charlie-puth-talks-interpolation\/","title":{"rendered":"Taylor Swift ‘Wood’ Song Copy Debate: Charlie Puth Talks Interpolation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n\tAs TikTokers argue over whether Taylor Swift\u2019s new songs sound like old classics, Charlie Puth is taking to social media to explain how songwriting actually works \u2014 telling fans that \u201cthere\u2019s only 12 notes in a scale\u201d and people need to \u201cstop demonizing\u201d similar songs.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe singer\u2019s explainer video, posted to TikTok<\/a>, came amid a week-long internet debate over several songs from Swift\u2019s new album The Life of a Showgirl<\/em>, including claims that her \u201cWood\u201d borrowed too much of its sound from \u201cI Want You Back\u201d by The Jackson 5.<\/p>\n

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\n\tPuth never mentions Swift or her new album by name, but says he made the video because \u201clately there\u2019s been a lot of discussion about when two songs have similar melodies.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThere\u2019s only 12 notes in a scale,\u201d Puth reminded fans, counting them out on a keyboard. \u201cSo when you\u2019re writing a new song, there are bound to be similarities to an old song.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tPuth\u2019s video centers on the issue of interpolation<\/em> \u2014 the intentional use of existing musical elements from an earlier song when writing a new one. It\u2019s sometimes confused with sampling<\/em>, which involves adding an actual snippet of a sound recording into a new one.<\/p>\n

\n\tAccording to Puth, similarities between two melodies only become full-scale interpolation when they reach five consecutive identical notes. Below that mark, he says a string of the same notes is just that \u2014 a common musical tool from a shared cultural tool set that doesn\u2019t need to be credited or licensed.<\/p>\n

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\n\tTo make the point, he compared a Fifth Harmony song to a Hailee Steinfeld song, pointing out that they start with four identical notes but then split in different sonic directions: \u201cSo in this case, no interpolation!\u201d Puth said. He then contrasted that with the Portugal. The Man hit \u201cFeel It Still,\u201d which borrowed amply from a 1960s R&B song \u2014 and credits it as such. \u201cIn that case, interpolation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhile Puth\u2019s video offers valuable insight into industry practice from the perspective of a prolific songwriter, it doesn\u2019t exactly track actual copyright law, which governs when one artist must<\/em> pay for and credit the use of existing material. There is no hard-and-fast rule for the number of notes that constitutes infringement, and courts typically weigh a broader analysis, including similarities in other musical elements and whether the original song is even unique enough to warrant copyright protection.<\/p>\n

\n\tFinding that actual legal dividing line is much harder than Puth makes it out to be. In 2015, a federal jury found that Robin Thicke and Pharrell\u2019s \u201cBlurred Lines\u201d had infringed Marvin Gaye\u2019s \u201cGot To Give It Up\u201d \u2014 a verdict widely seen as making it easier to sue over similar-sounding songs. But in a 2022 decision, an appeals court cleared Katy Perry of lifting a portion of her \u201cDark Horse\u201d from an earlier track, ruling that artists must be free to reuse common musical phrases.<\/p>\n

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\n\tFaced with that uncertainty, many artists, songwriters and record labels simply err on the side of caution, offering interpolation licenses and credits in any situation that is even legally debatable. That\u2019s why Olivia Rodrigo credited Paramore on her \u201cGood 4 U\u201d, and why Sam Smith decided to add a credit to his \u201cStay With Me\u201d over similarities with Tom Petty\u2018s 1989 song \u201cI Won\u2019t Back Down.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn Swift\u2019s case, comparisons of \u201cWood\u201d and \u201cI Want You Back\u201d have drawn the most debate. But internet sleuths have also scrutinized the overlap between \u201cThe Life of a Showgirl\u201d and \u201cCool\u201d by the Jonas Brothers, and \u201cActually Romantic\u201d and \u201cWhere Is My Mind\u201d by the Pixies. (The album\u2019s \u201cFather Figure\u201d is an outright interpolation of George Michael\u2019s 1988 hit of the same name approved by the late singer\u2019s estate.)<\/p>\n

\n\tContrary to the clear-cut analysis explained in Puth\u2019s video, whether any of those songs actually required an interpolation license or a credit from Swift is a question that only a federal court could decide after years of litigation. None of the artists behind the debated songs have publicly threatened such a lawsuit against her, or even mentioned the similarities.<\/p>\n

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\n\tFor years, veteran songwriters like Ed Sheeran have chafed at how similar-sounding songs are reflexively treated as theft. Copyright lawsuits over such situations have proliferated over the past decade, targeting Dua Lipa, Miley Cyrus and Sheeran several times. And the rush to litigation is no doubt fueled by how the issue is debated on social media and sites like YouTube, where mashup videos posted by non-experts often imply legal wrongdoing.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThere\u2019s only so many notes and very few chords used in pop music,\u201d Sheeran said back in 2022 after beating one such case. \u201cCoincidence is bound to happen if 60,000 songs are being released every day on Spotify. That\u2019s 22 million songs a year and there\u2019s only 12 notes that are available.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn his video this week, Puth echoes those same sentiments. Though he doesn\u2019t dive into the legal specifics of when licenses are needed, he argues more broadly that good-faith overlap is inevitable in modern music and should not be viewed as intentional copying or theft.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIf I could just take a moment and say this: Sometimes artists will accidentally interpolate each other, and it\u2019s almost never done maliciously,\u201d Puth says in the TikTok video. \u201cWe have to really stop demonizing this when it happens. Interpolations and sampling, this stuff has been going on for a really long time, and some great music has come about because of it.\u201d<\/p>\n

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As TikTokers argue over whether Taylor Swift\u2019s new songs sound like old classics, Charlie Puth is taking to social media to explain how songwriting actually works \u2014 telling […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8151,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[6880,6833,3269,6882,6881,986,3029,547,3028,3222],"class_list":["post-8150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lawyers","tag-charlie","tag-copy","tag-debate","tag-interpolation","tag-puth","tag-song","tag-swift","tag-talks","tag-taylor","tag-wood"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8150"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8150\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usatrustedlawyers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}