Photo Credit: Ye performing “Hurricane” during the Donda listening event in Atlanta (Apple Music)
A federal jury found Kanye West liable for copyright infringement over the track “Hurricane,” first played at a listening party for his album Donda. It’s the latest in a long string of copyright infringement cases for the virulently antisemitic rapper.
On Tuesday, a federal Los Angeles jury found Kanye West (who now goes by Ye), as well as his business entities, liable for copyright infringement for using an uncleared sample of the instrumental track “MSD PT2” as the foundation for his song “Hurricane.”
The infringement was first brought to the rightsholders’ attention during a listening party in Atlanta back in 2021 for Ye’s album Donda, though the lawsuit wasn’t filed until 2024. The event drew a sold-out crowd at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium and was also livestreamed to millions more.
Despite Ye having given the original artists songwriting credits, the plaintiff—representing the creators, DJ Khalil, Sam Barsh, Dan Seeff, and Josh Mease—argued that the work was used without license, clearance, or payment.
The jury agreed and found Ye, as well as his company, Yeezy LLC, individually liable to the tune of $176,153 in damages. His other companies, Yeezy Supply LLC and Ox Paha Inc., were found liable for $41,625 and $44,627, respectively.
The plaintiff, Artist Revenue Advocates LLC, originally sought $30 million, which got knocked down to a mere $438,000. Ye’s legal team has been working to have this further lowered to only $176,153 by merging corporate liabilities.
Ye’s team argued that the artist sang over the track during the Atlanta event, but later removed it from the final album version since he had not gotten clearance. But the defense failed to convince the jury that the use was protected by an “implied license” or that the event was a non-profitable marketing expense.
The final tally that Ye and his companies currently face includes the requested damages of $562,046, which includes a portion of “infringing rights” from ticket sales, a $1.25 million Apple streaming deal, and any related Yeezy merch sales.
The trial lasted a week, beginning on May 4 in Los Angeles federal court. Notably, only a narrow portion of the original lawsuit was allowed to go to trial after a judge dismissed the bulk of the lawsuit in February.
The judge determined that Artist Revenue Advocates LLC only owns the master recording rights to “MSD PT2,” not the composition rights. Therefore, the company was only able to sue for the uncleared sample—not the fact that Ye performed an “interpolation” of the song during the listening event.
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