Reggae icon Eddy Grant has claimed a track featured on Gorillaz new album ‘Plastic Beach‘ is a copy of his 1983 song ‘Time Warp’.
Speaking to nme.com, Grant said there are similarities between his own track and the new Gorillaz single ‘Stylo’: “Damon Albarn knows in his heart of hearts – it’s unfortunate that we cant get into people’s hearts – he knows that this is a song that he’s loved, in his club day. I don’t know the guy, but he knows this is a song he loves.”
Later, Grant said he believed his label EMI, which also represents Gorillaz, should have picked up on the alleged likeness: “It has to go back to the beginning, where it should have started with a phone call from Damon to my publisher. My publisher would have contacted me – the publisher being of course the same EMI that looks after his music. In a properly configured relationship I would have gotten a call from EMI to say, ‘Damon wants to use ‘Time Warp’. What arrangement can you guys come to? Would you claim 100 per cent, would you claim 60 per cent, or 70 per cent of whatever it is?’
“That phone call never came. Instead what happened is somebody went straight to a musicologist, implying that there was some kind of pre-knowledge of some kind of infringement.”
‘Time Warp’ was the b-side to Eddy Grant’s 1983 single ‘Electric Avenue‘, which hit #2 in the charts on both sides of the Atlantic. Gorillaz new album ‘Plastic Beach‘ was released last week, and debuted at no.2 in the UK.