Lil Uzi Vert faces copyright suit over “Just Wanna Rock”.

Philadelphia rapper Lil Uzi Vert All things considered, has been pretty low-key this year. In the last few days we have learned about two cases involving them. The latest is a massive, $110,000,000 copyright submission from Rochester, New York, artist Rief Rakyal.

The Persistence of the People Grouchy Gregory Watkins AllHipHop, The centerpiece of this go with is Lil Uzi Verts “Simply Wanna Rock” October 2022 hit document. Sharrief Bouchet (or Rief Rawyal) alleges the Everlasting Atake MC re-created almost all of the ingredients of “Ache and Pleasure,” his song that he released in August, of the same year.

“[Lil Uzi Vert] Copying the hook, theme and melody of “Ache and Pleasure”, along with the mantra, “After i rock ah-ah” is a common practice. Brian McBrearty is a musicologist who specializes in forensics. He founded Musicologize and investigated similarities between the two songs. The results are quite stunning.

McBrearty responded by stating that a derivation of 93-97% was found between the two. The tempo and rhythmic patterns of “rock”, the “ah’ chants, as well as the lyrical phrases, are all almost identical.

To get much more technical, Uzi and Rawyal’s songs each “reside within the core band of ‘allegro,'” which equates to 130–150 beats per minute. Their respective albums also share the same drum sample, rhythmic syncopation and other elements, commonly called “tresillo.”

Each song ends with the same phrase “rock” in first-person present-tense.

Rawyal also claims that Instagram and Facebook have muted his “Ache and Pleasure”, or removed them. Uzi’s song “Simply Wanna Rock”, which was a huge hit in many places, also exploded at the same time.

How could this have happened? Rawyal claims that Atlantic Information as well as Uzi had access to Rawyal’s materials. He alleges that he was in collaboration with AR and Lanre Gaba, the now president of Hip-Hop, R&B and International Music on the label since 2012.

Rawyal claimed he gave Gaba original music, demos, etc. This, he believes, paved the way for Uzi’s team and Atlantic News to obtain his work. Lil Uzi Vert is the plaintiff, along with Atlantic Information, Technology Now and Warner Music Group.

In addition to the loss of streaming revenues, licensing opportunities, and damage to his reputation, the artist is seeking $110,000,000 in damages. In addition, he wants a retroactive publishing credit, an ownership share and an order that prevents any further use of the song.