Can someone explain why the Yamamoto thing was a big deal?

[Cold Skin]

Well, I think he didn't plagiarize as much as people are led to believe, given that there are many examples of comparisons where it's just vaguely similar or just a small part of the song that somehow mirrors an existing song.
With the number of songs currently existing in music history, I'm pretty sure any soundtracks or songs does end up sounding similar to other soundtracks or songs whether it was the original intent or not.
Inspiration has to come from somewhere, and I'm sure 50% of a composer's creations are more or less a mimic of something he heard before in his life or even something they never even knew about, even if they will never be aware of that themselves.

However, as others said, there is a point in music where you can definately tell that this is so much a copy from the original that it can't be unintentionnal inspiration.
I never found most of Yamamoto's tracks to be a copies of anything, even the "Star Wars march" case was nowhere close enough to be deemed stolen at all... BUT there is at least one track that makes it clear he took it directly, and that's the one from Avatar (which I never saw but I did hear the original track from it)!
This can't be simply hommage or inspiration, the thing has the exact same rhythm, the exact same notes, with the same kind of instruments at the same moment, for a long length... Put simply, If you paste one track over the other, that's like a perfect match! If you had slipped Avatar's track instead of the Yamamoto one on the DB OST, all those watching the episodes and not knowing about Avatar would have believed it was the very track from the anime without even thinking twice.
In such a case, yes, the track was stolen, and the problem is not so much about using a track meant for another work, but crediting yourself as the composer and the one who deserves praise if the track is a success.

Now, I do agree that taking out the whole score was somewhat an extreme way to solve things, and a waste of excellent tracks! But given Kei's revelations, it seems they were simply overwhelmed: they first tried to take out only the problematic ones - just like I would have liked myself -, but ultimately, it became impossible to say "this track is not plagiarized, that's for sure!", and they couldn't afford to take risk if suddenly they were sued by ten different owners for ten different plagiarized tracks. The amount of money at risk would have had the potential to put the whole company in danger. They had no choice, surely they are the first ones who wanted to avoid having to spend extra time on Kai replacing every single track on every single episode released, but they had their back against the wall.

I understand how they were scared and acting accordingly, the first thing I don't agree with is the fact that they replaced the score when there were only two episodes left.
After 95 episodes of suspicions without anything happening, the situation was not much that much of an emergency to not be able to wait for two more weeks.
Secondly, I understand how they didn't want to spend more money on a finished product they were happy to get rid off, but using the old Kikuchi's score was a terrible choice: part of the concept of Kai is "with some whole new music!!!", and you don't take something away from the concept itself. They should have used a score that was not the one from the original Dragon Ball Z, even if it meant paying another composer AGAIN for it. But money issues come first, so we can't blame them for how the system works.

[kei17]

@ kei17 I guess that's the reason why DragonBall Z Kai Episode 95 ( Yamamoto ) had two musicless scenes ?
( Cell returns , Vegeta avenges Trunks )

Maybe so. Actually, soon after Toei acknowledged the plagiarism, they sent FUNi an alternate version of the BGM track which lacks the two specific pieces: The Ebb And The Flow and A New Foe Rears His Head. Some scenes had these pieces replaced with other "safe" ones, and the others were left silent. FUNimation first produced the early Android arc episodes with the original BGM track and Nicktoons streamed them on their official website, but some of them got replaced with the alternate version when they were broadcast on TV.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUfSUsb9wds

[dbboxkaifan]

Because of the removal of Yamamoto's music it ruined the experience for me:

1) DB Kai Parts 5-8 didn't feature Yamamoto's soundtrack and the replacement score was unbearable, but since I bought I forced myself to watch it anyway. At least for the last two Kai episodes the Kikuchi placements were actually pretty good, thank god.

2) DB Raging Blast 2 had BT2's music as replacement for the newer copies which made it hard to find with the authentic score, but I finally have a copy of it (well, two of them).

3) I just prefer the original music over replacements.

[FindKenshi]

How do you feel if Dragon Ball were found to be horribly unoriginal that it's rather a patchwork of things from other series and artists? I'm sure I'd stop being a fan. And it is why I'm no longer a Jojo fan.

It already is.. the story started as a retelling of Journey to the west..

Very famous classical writings like Journey to the west don't count.

Very famous classical music pieces don't count.

See what I did there!?

[NeoKING]

How do you feel if Dragon Ball were found to be horribly unoriginal that it's rather a patchwork of things from other series and artists? I'm sure I'd stop being a fan. And it is why I'm no longer a Jojo fan.

Whoa, maybe wanna PM me about the JoJo deal, there. Sounds interesting.

[kei17]

Very famous classical writings like Journey to the west don't count.

Very famous classical music pieces don't count.
See what I did there!?

I said Journey to the west didn't count because it's in the public domain and every, I say every Japanese knows it. It's like Beethoven's Symphony No. 5. But what Yamamoto stole was not classic music in the public domain.

[Black_Liger]

Very famous classical writings like Journey to the west don't count.

Very famous classical music pieces don't count.
See what I did there!?

I said Journey to the west didn't count because it's in the public domain and every, I say every Japanese knows it. It's like Beethoven's Symphony No. 5. But what Yamamoto stole was not classic music in the public domain.

Makes sense actually, it would suck if toriyama got sued for using Journey to the west as basis for dragon ball lol!

I'm a yamamoto fan myself, but I guess there was nothing to be done. I would atleast hope for them to get more of the kikuchi music... I mean playing cell's theme for a saibaman?? Buu saga music in saiyan saga?!? :S

[MCDaveG]

Isn't it perfectly normal for musical artists to borrow basic themes from music that they like greatly? That's more of a homage than anything... this is called a "sample" and uncredited samples seem to be a norm in Japan. Just look at the Mother series (Earthbound in America.) In Mother 2 alone, there's several pieces of music "copying" (paying homage) to rock icons and the like.. as detailed at Starmen.net. http://earthboundcentral.com/2013/01/ea ... mple-hunt/

Looks like tons of uncredited copyright musical tunes and such in that game, yet the game came out in America just fine and no lawsuits ever happened. Was this all making a big deal out of nothing?

I'm musician here.... OK, I'll get the melodies from Avatar bgm score track, play them and little spice them to sound little different. Then, I'll release it for money..........
I can guarantee that sooner or later, I'm in a big s**t in suspicion of plagiarism and going to be sued, ending to pay a big amount of money.....
I heavily sampled score from Danny Elfman's Alice, making a Breaks remix, so Elfman was clearly credited, it wasn't for money then, but for friends on soundcloud to listen.
It was taken down in few seconds after upload with suspicion of copyright infrigment. So I uploaded it for friends on mediafire. Down after 20 minutes, with links on itunes to buy the original......
The same Elfman did the score for Terminator Salvation, which Yamamoto ripped off. And Yamamoto wasn't making remixes, but stating it's his own work. Really unbelieavable.....

this is called a "sample" and uncredited samples seem to be a norm in Japan.

What is norm in Japan, isn't norm worldwide. To sample anything, you have to get permission from the artist who made the original track.... He will then simply gave you permission and you will pay him royalties from your record with that sample, if you are not his close friend.....
Or your sample must have criteria of being not more than 2 seconds long and barely recognizable. Which is called microsampling. Justice does this a lot and I do this as well. I sample sounds of drums for example
Don't know, why everyone thinks that everything, that you can't touch upon with bare hands, is free nowadays.

BTW: I borrowed some mellody after all in this unreleased track! The hint is, that hardcore RPG gamers should recognize the melody there (not sampled, whole track is recorded from scratch).
http://soundcloud.com/dynamixxprince/hi ... ex-machina

[Duo]

It probably would have grown more and more problematic as it became more and more involved in the international market. The timing makes sense in that regard. All I ever heard compared was Battle Point Unlimited to its original source and I knew the argument was lost for whether or not he plagiarized. I also agree that it is too bad, simply because the replacement score was really poorly placed and didn't sample nearly enough material. The Yamamoto score had that problem too, but it was at least written with that context somewhat in mind. Kikuchi's work was mostly taken from actual film scores.

[penguintruth]

Well, I did like Yamamoto's music, but I like Kikuchi's music better.

Yes, people will always say, "Well, the placement of Kikuchi's music in Kai is bad!" It isn't, really. A lot of the placement is quite good. Sometimes it's problematic. But I find a lot of it very enjoyable. The episode where Gohan defeats Cell, for instance, has some of the best placement in either Kai or original Z.

I'm just miffed I never got to get that Yamamoto piece for Gohan's SSJ2 transformation. It's no "Unmei no Hi", but it was pretty damn good.

[Duo]

Well, I did like Yamamoto's music, but I like Kikuchi's music better.

Yes, people will always say, "Well, the placement of Kikuchi's music in Kai is bad!" It isn't, really. A lot of the placement is quite good. Sometimes it's problematic. But I find a lot of it very enjoyable. The episode where Gohan defeats Cell, for instance, has some of the best placement in either Kai or original Z.

I'm just miffed I never got to get that Yamamoto piece for Gohan's SSJ2 transformation. It's no "Unmei no Hi", but it was pretty damn good.

There were definitely some really well set and paced moments (look at the #17 v Piccolo episodes), but then you get the Kai replacement scene for Gohan turning Super Saiyan 2. Even if it's just a minute or so of footage, it just does not work at all. Should have at least shoved the Yamamoto piece in for that scene, I'd have liked to seen it that way too.

With both scores, it got to the point where I would starting singing the piece that would play as it started, just knowing what they were going to use based on the scene. Always the same for a hero charging in, or another piece for the villain winning in some way, or a piece for the villain showing that the attack didn't hurt him at all, or somebody getting hurt, or a big attack being unleashed. You could really get the point where you'd be able to call it pretty dependably.

[Black_Liger]

Well, I did like Yamamoto's music, but I like Kikuchi's music better.

Yes, people will always say, "Well, the placement of Kikuchi's music in Kai is bad!" It isn't, really. A lot of the placement is quite good. Sometimes it's problematic. But I find a lot of it very enjoyable. The episode where Gohan defeats Cell, for instance, has some of the best placement in either Kai or original Z.

I'm just miffed I never got to get that Yamamoto piece for Gohan's SSJ2 transformation. It's no "Unmei no Hi", but it was pretty damn good.

There were definitely good placements, but as far as I remember, there were a lot of different musical motifs for each saga in dbz, I recall that every saga got new music.

The main problem with Kai/Kikuchi is that it's a butchered version of the kikuchi score, it doesn't even respect the themes he composed using music from EVERY dbz saga in every arc of Kai, it felt just terrible listening to buu saga battle themes in the saiyan saga, more so with yamamoto atleast we got new music per arc, while with the kikuchi score they just throw in random pieces of the "Complete" Collection. Which I think it's not even half the music that yamamoto composed for the series.

[Gaffer Tape]

While that is true, that different parts of the series had different music, it's not quite as specific as you would think. The majority of the score was composed for the movies, and, as each movie came out, its score would trickle down into the TV series. Relatively little (especially in the Z era) was composed specifically for the series.

[Duo]

While that is true, that different parts of the series had different music, it's not quite as specific as you would think. The majority of the score was composed for the movies, and, as each movie came out, its score would trickle down into the TV series. Relatively little (especially in the Z era) was composed specifically for the series.

Yeah, it's by that point that I don't mind if it's from the wrong time period if compared to Z - both just sound like they're borrowing from the movie scores to me. I still didn't like the placement in Kai, though. Too predictable.

[Gaffer Tape]

I was just clarifying. That doesn't mean I necessarily agree with haphazardly placing it. Because even through the technicalities of it, the reality is that each story arc did have its own sound for the most part.

[coola]

Not that i defend plagiarism, but, to be honest, video games in early/late 80 also liked to "borrow" other works, yet no one complained.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thTUazbke7A 0:19
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpSgJvTGumY

[AgitoZ]

Not that i defend plagiarism, but, to be honest, video games in early/late 80 also liked to "borrow" other works, yet no one complained.

Well, video games weren't exactly "mainstream" at that point. I don't think no one complained, I just think anyone with any stake in the matter just didn't know. If something like, I don't know, Call of Duty stole some music I think people would complain.

Also, I'm not sure about the 2nd example, but the first video you posted just kinda sounds like Moonlight Sonata. And I'm pretty sure classical music is fair game for everybody.

[Kroni_Hunter]

Personally I'm not convinced that these similarities were intentional, I didn't even hear the similarities before a side by side comparison and to be fair there were plenty of differences in each one. They say that everything has been done before, and every new song is just a new personalization of something that came before. I write music, and some of it is undoubtedly influenced by the style and tone of other music that I enjoy.

A clip from Vsauce comes to mind, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAcjV60RnRw
It's a very interesting video, and towards the end of it he discusses this very idea.

"Even though mathematically speaking, there are so many possible unique melodies that we can safely say "there will always be room for new music" we don't seem to be wired to care. We enjoy certain patterns and melodies, and calculating how many there could be is a lot less interesting then how connected and similar all the ones we enjoy are."

[Pikachuuu]

Because he didn't "borrow" it, he stole it.