The estate of Donna Summer filed a copyright lawsuit against Kanye West on Tuesday (Feb. 27), accusing him of “shamelessly” using her 1977 hit “I Feel Love” without permission in his song “Good (Don’t Die).”
In a complaint filed in Los Angeles federal court, Summer’s estate made good on public allegations earlier this month that claimed West had infringed the copyright to her song by interpolating it in “Good,” which he released on his chart-topping Vultures 1 album.
The estate’s attorneys say West “shamelessly used instantly recognizable portions” of her song in his track, despite the fact that her estate had already “explicitly denied” him authorization to do so.
“Summer’s estate … wanted no association with West’s controversial history and specifically rejected West’s proposed use,” her attorneys write. “In the face of this rejection, defendants arrogantly and unilaterally decided they would simply steal ‘I Feel Love’ and use it without permission.”
The Summer estate’s lawyers say West re-recorded “almost verbatim” the key portions of her song and then used them as the hook for his own. She says the songs were so similar that fans and critics “instantly recognized” Kanye’s track as a “blatant rip-off.”
After the estate’s public statements earlier this month, “Good (Don’t Die)” was quickly pulled down from streaming platforms and has seemingly been removed from digital versions of the album. But the Summer estate says the damage is already done, and that legal action must be taken.
“This lawsuit is about more than Defendants’ mere failure to pay the appropriate licensing fee for using another’s musical property,” the estate’s lawyers write. “It is also about the rights of artists to decide how their works are used and presented to the public, and the need to prevent anyone from simply stealing creative works when they cannot secure the right to use them legally.”
A rep for West did not immediately return a request for comment.
This is a developing story.
