Song Unrecognized on This Service is Retired by Music Continues

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kwadguy Senior Member Thread Starter

How about songs that sound to you like total nicks of other songs, but which are not generally described as such. (That means, excluding stuff like He's So Fine/My Sweet Lord, or the similarity between the beginning of Stairway to Heaven and a certain Spirit Song, etc...In other words, similarities that you've noticed by the world at large doesn't seem to hvae grabbed onto...)
One for me: ELO's "Hang on Tight" sounds like a ripoff of Melanie's "Look What They Done (To My Song Ma)", right down to the inclusion of a verse in French!

Kwad
Girl Don't Tell Me by The Beach Boys.
Ripped from Ticket To Ride. (Parts of it).
John Lennon "Starting Over" -
one line sounds to me like "Don't Worry Baby"
some of the nicks that have always come to my mind are snippets (maybe not total nicks), like an intro or a lead break--and with some of these groups I can't tell if it's a nick of a good thing or paying homage to great songs of the past or both. Here's some I've noticed:
the intros to "Wild Weekend" by the Rockin' Rebels (63) and The Cars "My Best Friend's Girlfriend"

the intros to "Boston" by Freddie Cannon (60) and "My Sharona" by The Knack (79).

the main guitar riff on which these 4 songs are built around: "Then I kissed Him" Crystals, "When You Walk in the Room" Jackie DeShannon, "Mr. Tambourine Man" Byrds, "Ticket to Ride" Beatles

Chuck Berry "I'm Talkin' 'Bout You" (61) and The Beatles "I Saw Her Standing There" (63) -- same bass, similar melody on the main verse

the decending notes on these two verses:
"Last night I said these words to my girl" Beatles Please Please Me '62
"Here he comes, that's Cathy's Clown" Everly Brothers '60

George Harrison's trademark sound of cascading guitar lines (like in Cream's Badge and parts of Abbey Road) was so good scores of bands nicked it for themselves throughout the period '69 to '75 or so, with the Stealer's Wheel beautiful "Benediction" coming to mind (hey, btw, how about some Stealer's Wheel remastering? 2 way underrated lps by this duo)

I wish I could remember the biggest nick of all I heard a year or two ago here in Japan on the American armed services radio. A recent rock hit patterned law-suit close to Bad Company's 1975 hit "Feel Like Makin' Love"
Christina Aguilera's song "Beautiful" sounds similar to Carole King's "Beautiful". Maybe I just think so because of the same title, but I swear it sounds like she ripped off Carole's melody.
The "nah-na-na-na-na-na-nah-na-na-na" line from Deep Purple's "Hush" bears a striking melodic similarity to John Lennon's "ahhhhs" from the Beatles' "A Day In the Life".
Deep Purple's "Black Night" riff is very similar to the Blues Magoos' "We Ain't Got Nothin' Yet"
Stone Temple Pilots "Sex Type Thing" off Core sure sounds a lot like KISS' "War Machine" off Creatures of the Night.
Mok Has Potential

the chorus from No Doubt's "Don't Speak" and the chorus from Sergio Mendes' "Never Gonna Let You Go"
Also nicked by Sir Paul McCartney in the last part of the guitar solo in Maybe I'm Amazed. Listen for the backing guitar part; it sounds like it's right from Abbey Road (the album not the place.)
Kym Former Resident

Yes! And the intro to "Don't Speak" kinda sounds like Aerosmith's "Dream On"...
I always thought Sheryl Crow's "All I Wanna Do" sounds a lot like Stealers Wheel's "Stuck In The Middle Of You," perhaps more in arrangement than melody.
Some good ears here. I like the word "nick", especially the "snippet" variety mentioned by dgsinner.
I hear that a lot, but I can't keep track of all the times I've said that about little similarities in records. Just today I was listening to Linda Ronstadt and the Stone Ponys "Different Drum", and I kept thinking it reminded me of "Walk Away Rene"

I suppose today it is called "sampling".

Sometimes it's probably just a guitar lick or a drum thing that's "in the air", other times there is internal evidence it's deliberate, or easy to imagine how it happened. I came across one recently that I am planning a separate post on, when I get my facts straight.
Shania Twain's From This Moment is a "hybrid ripoff", it rips off Bette Midler's From A Distance AND Joe Cocker's Love Will Lift Us Up Where We Belong
"LA is a great big freeway/put a hundred down and buy a car" sounds to me like a song from a couple of years before by the Cowsills, "I remember Sunday morning/I would meet him at the park..." Also Hoagy Carmichael's Stardust has an intro line that reads, "And now the purple dusk of twilight time..." which reminds me of Charlie Chaplin's Love This Is My Song.
I always thought that the riff in Pink Floyd's "Wish You You Were Here" was lifted straight from Van Morrison's "Almost Independence Day"
Another one that I recently disovered - The intro to the "Scarlet Lady" by Honeybus sounds like it was appropriated for Fleetwood Mac's "Never Going Back Again". Could be a coincidence but it sounds just like it.
Blondie's "Call Me" vs. Black Sabbath's "Children Of The Grave"
and the "We Ain't Got Nothing Yet" riff is identical to the one James Burton uses behind Ricky Nelson on "Summertime" from the Legendary Masters Vol. 2 CD.
The Move - Blackberry Way and The Beatles - Penny Lane
Pug Elitist Snob

The intro always reminded me of Supertramp's "Breakfast In America".
Sean
Pug Elitist Snob

The Kinks "Catch Me Now I'm Falling" reminds me of the Rollimg Stones "Jumping Jack Flash".
Sean
I gotta hear that !!
I can listen to anything with James Burton on it.
rjp Senior Member

oh yeah - shadows of knight
i'm a man - yardbirds
same song?
The hook from Matchbox 20's "Push" (the "I will, I will" part) is lifted exactly from "Love Will Keep Us Together". I've wondered a long time now if that was intentional.
One that always got to me was "Waterfalls" by TLC. They use the same lyrics as McCartney's "Waterfalls" off McCartney II.
Who else could think up the line "Don't go chasing Waterfalls"?
Joe L.
What I got - Sublime
Lady Madonna - by you know who
the beginning sounds very much the same on the Sublime song