Songs that rip off riffs/rythyms from older, obscure bands

chewbaccadoll

chewbaccadoll

Sr Member
In a culture where everything gets "sampled" in pop music I think about earlier music that was plagiarized or copied (either willingly or subconsciously) and find it interesting. Thought I'd start a thread.

Now, I don't think every case is a "rip off", I believe 2 separate people can come up with a similar piece (note I said piece) of music by coincidence, I'm not that closed minded.

It is interesting to listen to some of the examples out there and try and determine for yourself.

Here's an example:

Iron Maiden's "2 Minutes To Midnight"
YouTube - ‪Iron Maiden-2 Minutes To Midnight‬‏

Now the band Budgie's (way before Maiden) "Wildfire"
YouTube - ‪Budgie - Wildfire‬‏

Budgie also did the original version of "Breadfan" which Metallica covered. Simialr genre, and Budgie has a sound that seems to have influenced other bands, at least to me.

I believe it's possible (because I did it... AND WITH A RIFF FROM A MAIDEN TUNE!) to hear something, then later in life go to write a song a that riff might creep up subconsciously and you think you wrote it.

And then there's just plain 'ole ripping off.

Post some o0f your own examples! There are a lot of obvious mainstream one's, and feel free to post them, but I think the more obscure one's or known abouts are more fun.

Any genre of music, btw! I have more and will post later.

-K
 
Also, the "Phantom of the Opera" theme was directly lifted from Pink Floyd's "Echoes" by Andrew Lloyd Webber.
 
Metallica and Megadeth have been doing it back and forth for years. This is just one example...


Megadeth - Holy Wars:
YouTube - ‪Megadeth - Holy Wars...The Punishment Due‬‏

Metallica - The Call of Ktulu
And about 53 seconds into the song, the riff played is the same chords as Holy Wars:
YouTube - ‪The Call of Ktulu - Metallica‬‏

These are pretty obscure chords, so this was the example I went with. There are certainly others between these two bands that really don't like each other at all.

-Ss
 
Almost any cover by a modern artist is likely to have me ranting and raving as much as re-makes do.

What makes me angry is when a perfectly awesome song is covered, the cover is a flacid, engineered piece of crap and, most importantly, people think the new artist just made this 'great new' song up - No-one ever credits the original writer.

Case in point - People telling me about this 'new' Madonna song called American Pie....
I have only very bad language in reply to this, so I'll stop before I say something that gets me banned!!

Surprisingly, I am not against people covering songs in general:
- Joan Jett did a lot of it, partly to prove she could perform just as well (if not better) as the men of rock.
- Blues artists seem to all cover each others songs anyway and each has a very cool, new interpretation.
- The Beatles always sounded crap to me, yet I love a lot of their songs when covered by other artists... The only time I liked The Beatles' sound was at a younger time and I took something a touch illegal ;) But that says a lot to me about an artist, if their music only makes sense when you're high...


But yeah - So long as people know where the credit for the song belongs and realise that the original may be far superior to the latest tacky, manufactured mass-culture pop-singer silliness...
 
Some of the comments remind me of when Wayne's World the movie used Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" in the soundtrack and younger people were like "What a great new song!"

Not really relevant, especially as it was a good thing... for Queen obviously, plus exposing younger kids who wouldn't have heard the song.

I find I almost always (almost) like the original better than the cover unless it was covered in a way that makes it a different song entirely. Then, sometimes that's an exception.
 
I dunno. Manfred Mann's cover of Blinded by the Light is MUCH better than Bruce's original. As far as Queen goes, I doubt there will ever be a band like that again. The Paul Rodgers thing(Speaking of covers) just sounded like garbage.
 
I was deeply annoyed by Jay Z's "Young Forever" re-writing of Alphaville's "Forever Young." Took a thoughtful, melancholy 80s tune and made it some lame party anthem. Boo!
 
I'm so with you on Manfred Mann's Blinded - so much better than Bruce - They also redid his song, "Spirits in the Night" - and now totally own it. I'm also with you on Paul Rogers - Queen needed to realize they cannot go on without Freddie - it's impossible.
And Chewbaccadoll - you think Wayne's World was something when it comes to the kids - want till the movie with Borat playing Freddie hits the screens - kids are going to be listening to "The Game" and "It's a Kind of Magic" in their cars.

People have hit me with these two comparisons - I can hear it when I break it down.

First - one of the most cluttered and overrated bands in history - Yeah, I said it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTWKbfoikeg

who stole from one of the greatest rock bands who crafted one of the greatest rock songs ever.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNJS2qXTDTk&feature=fvst
 
Last edited:
chewbaccadoll said:
I find I almost always (almost) like the original better than the cover unless it was covered in a way that makes it a different song entirely. Then, sometimes that's an exception.
Click to expand...

I don't have any mentions for rip-offs, but I just wanted to throw in on this note that I don't particularly care for Nine Inch Nails or their original for "Hurt", and I don't like Johnny Cash's music at all, but his version of "Hurt" is one of my all-time favorite songs.
 
The beginning of that song "You're Beautiful" (or something like that) is the same as the end credits for the Hulk TV series.
 
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