Miley Cyrus might actually need some flowers after all.
The 31-year-old singer is facing a lawsuit over allegedly copying the 2013 Bruno Mars song "When I Was Your Man" for her hit single "Flowers," which took home Record of the Year and Best Pop Solo Performance at the 2024 Grammy Awards.
Music-rights acquiring firm Tempo, which purchased a percentage of the copyright in "When I Was Your Man" from co-songwriter Philip Lawrence, is accusing Cyrus and Sony Music Entertainment of copyright infringement over the similarities between the two songs.
Bruno Mars is not named as a plaintiff in the lawsuit.
In its complaint, Tempo alleges that Cyrus' song “duplicates numerous melodic, harmonic, and lyrical elements of 'When I Was Your Man,' including the melodic pitch design and sequence of the verse, the connecting bass-line, certain bars of the chorus, certain theatrical music elements, lyric elements, and specific chord progressions.”
“Any fan of Bruno Mars’ 'When I Was Your Man' knows that Miley Cyrus’ 'Flowers' did not achieve all of that success on its own,” Tempo adds in its lawsuit, which was filed with the US District Court for the Central District of California on Monday (September 16).
The complaint lists the similarities in lyrics, for example, the line “I should have bought your flowers and held your hand” from in "When I Was Your Man" is "echoed" by the line “I can buy myself flowers, write my name in the sand” from "Flowers." It also notes the E-D-C-E-F chord progression is used in both songs.
“It is undeniable based on the combination and number of similarities between the two recordings that 'Flowers' would not exist without 'When I Was Your Man',” the complaint argues. “Defendants knew or had reason to know that 'Flowers' is an unauthorized derivative work based on 'When I Was Your Man'… Defendants’ conduct has been, and continues to be, willful and knowing.”
In addition to Cyrus and Sony, "Flowers" co-songwriters Gregory “Aldae” Hein and Michael Pollack, along with Concord Music Publishing, Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp., and MCEO Inc., are also named as defendants in the lawsuit.
Tempo has also targeted music streaming services and retail stores for selling or streaming digital and physical copies of the song. It also lists Disney for “releasing a documentary concert series featuring Cyrus’ performance of 'Flowers' on March 10, 2023.”
In the the lawsuit, Tempo is seeking damages “in an amount to be determined at trial,” or otherwise the statutory maximum of $150,000 per infringement. Which if you do the math is a considerable sum of money.
You can read the full complaint for copyright infringement here.