A 50-year-old R&B singer by the name of Jesse Braham has filed a lawsuit against Taylor Swift seeking damages of $42 million, claiming she plagiarized ‘Shake It Off’ lyrics from his song ‘Haters Gone Hate’. Jesse Braham wrote his song back in 2013, and he’s arguing that there is NO POSSIBLE WAY that Taylor Swift‘s song could have existed without his lyrics, and therefore she (and her writers) must have plagiarized his music.
Here’s Jesse Braham’s song ‘Haters Gone Hate’, I’ll let you listen to it and then we can discuss the lawsuit down below:
According to ABC Australia, Jesse Braham actually tried to reach out to Taylor’s camp several times seeking a writer’s credit before he filed lawsuit:
Shake It Off includes the lines “cause the players gonna play, play, play, play, play / And the haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate,” while Graham’s song contains the phrase “haters gonna hate, players gonna play”.
Braham, also known as Jesse Graham onstage, told the Daily News that Swift’s song had “the same hook as mine”.
“If I didn’t write the song Haters Gone Hate, there wouldn’t be a song called Shake It Off,” he said.
Braham said he had spoken to Swift’s record label, Big Machine, four or five times about the issue.
He originally asked to be named as a writer, given credit for the song, and a selfie with the pop star, but was repeatedly dismissed and told his claim had no merit.
“At first I was going to let it go, but this song is my song all the way,” he said.
This is actually Taylor’s second (ongoing) major lawsuit. Not too long ago a former radio DJ filed suit against her alleging he was fired after she claimed he groped her, she’s since filed a counter suit.
As for whether or not the song was plagiarized you can hit play on that video above once more, and then you can check out Taylor’s ‘Shake It Off’, released in August of 2014 on Vevo (a year after ‘Haters Gone Hate’):
So, did she jack the lyrics or nah? Answers down below in the comments!