Creativity vs. Stealing pt. 1

"Thief!!!! Thief!!!!"

At least, that's what I screamed at my computer screen when I heard the new hit Coldplay song, "Viva La Vida". When played alongside the track "If I Could Fly" by Joe Satriani, the similarities border on plagiarism. But, being a musician myself, I understand that these things happen; so I decided to give them the benefit of the doubt and do some research. I flipped open my laptop and searched "Coldplay plagiarism", and found out that not only was Coldplay facing multiple charges of plagiarism, but they were facing those charges on the same song! The controversial track "Viva La Vida" is also under fire from Brooklyn Indie band "The Creaky Boards" for allegedly stealing the vocal melody for their track ironically named "The Songs I Didn't Write"... You can't make this stuff up. Surprisingly, the Rolling Stone article mentions that the Creaky Boards' lead singer had no hard feelings over the dispute, saying: “I wish Coldplay the best of luck. If they ever want to collaborate, I’ve got some microphones we could use in my bedroom." How's that for congeniality?

The scary truth is, utilizing creativity puts you at risk for becoming a thief. A large part of being creative is learning to turn off your subconscious critics and allow your mind to nurture even the most negligible thought process to fruition; But ay, there's the rub. By silencing your inner critic, you're allowing the possibility for other people's work to creep in subconsciously, and sometimes this can land you in a sticky situation, as Coldplay would probably tell you.

I was witness to another offense of thievery later that same day in my marketing concepts class. During the lecture, our instructor showed slides of advertisements he had taken from a nationwide business journal. The ad simply showed a glass of white wine, with the caption "A Chamblis that's not from Chamblis?". He followed it with another slide with a glass of champagne with the caption "A champagne that's not from Champagne?". (I looked for these ads online, but couldn't find it; if you know where to find them, I would love to be able to link them). He then asked us to guess who had paid for these advertisements. It wasn't a wine company, nor a champagne company. Surprisingly, the ads were funded by the European Union, who were (rather civilly) pointing out that their product names had been "stolen" from their original context and used to promote American products with no affiliation to their original creator. In this instance, the "thieves" had full knowledge of their crimes, and purposefully attached their product to the favorable image of their European counterpart.

So what separates these name-burgling companies from the alleged plagiarists of Coldplay? To me, it's as simple as one word: Creativity. I don't believe that Coldplay intentionally pulled material from outside sources, at least not in a sense that would indicate plagiarism. Their song "Viva La Vida" embodies distinct characteristics that make it unique from both Satriani and The Creaky Boards's songs, and though the vocal melody in the chorus has similar themes to both, I believe it can be considered a casualty of creativity. By that, I mean Coldplay's "theft" was merely an element of the creative process. In the case of the American companies using imported names to promote their products, thievery was used as a substitute for creativity. Their hopes were to associate their product with the image that authentic champagne had created for itself. This, to me, is the more serious crime.

Sometime next week I'll post round 2 of my Creativity vs. Stealing segment, and give my insight on what it means to be creative, and how to make sure your work is not only creative, but truly original. In a time where ideas are the currency of the future (yes, I'm stealing from you Tom, I realize the hypocrisy), it's essential to go through the creative process and not resort to idea theft.

For this week's listening recommendation:
"The Songs I Didn't Write" by The Creaky Boards