While the millions of One Direction fans around the world were likely ecstatic to watch the group’s latest music video upon its April 18 release, one Australian video production company was less than pleased.
Oh Yeah Wow, the production company in question, has accused the British boy band of plagiarizing in its video for “You And I,”according to an April 24 NME article.
Oh Yeah Wow claims that One Direction and “You And I” director Ben Winston “regurgitated” a video the company had shot for Clubfeet’s song “Everything You Wanted” in January 2013.
According to Oh Yeah Wow, the third act of the “You And I” video, in which the band members jump into freeze-frame shots of themselves, directly copies the Clubfeet video.
On its blog, Oh Yeah Wow expresses anger that “some affluent young bucks, and a director devoid of creativity, decide to effectively steal (and subsequently dilute) our idea.”
This is not the first time One Direction has been accused of plagiarism. Last year, fans of The Who claimed One Direction’s “Best Song Ever” sounded a little too similar to “Baba O’Riley,” and members of Def Leppard publicly remarked on how “similar in structure” One Direction’s “Midnight Memories” was to “Pour Some Sugar On Me,” though the band decided against taking legal action.
“This is nothing new. Plenty of artists have been accused of this,” explains Bryan Bolan, Founder and Creative Director at b-Mc creative. “As long as there is an open playing field, things like this will continue to occur, especially without any rules or regulations for situations such as this one. The ability to access music, photography and art is too abundant to regulate these types of situations. It becomes a moral issue. It is one thing to be influenced by an artist. However, there is a line between influence and recreation of creative work.”
Whether or not Oh Yeah Wow will pursue legal action against the band is unclear.
“To be crystal clear, OYW has nothing against creative evolution,” the company continued in its blog entry. “Artists constantly reinterpret other works that have inspired them and we’re fine with people taking a technique and using it to create something new…The wider problem is, that plagiarism and copycatting is becoming increasingly common and acceptable.”