Main music trade corporations and organizations are as soon as once more throwing their weight behind a proposed legislation that may stop rap and different lyrics from getting used as proof in prison and civil trials.
The Restoring Inventive Safety (RAP) Act was reintroduced within the US Home of Representatives on Thursday (July 24) by Georgia Democratic Rep. Hank Johnson and California Democratic Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove.
The invoice would change the principles of proof for federal courtrooms, making tune lyrics inadmissible except prosecutors can meet strict standards, similar to displaying that the lyrics had been meant to be taken actually.
It has the backing of music trade teams such because the Recording Academy and the Recording Business Affiliation of America (RIAA), in addition to main music corporations together with Common Music Group and Warner Music Group.
The difficulty of utilizing lyrics, notably rap lyrics, as proof in trials has been controversial for years, with many attorneys, lawmakers and activists arguing the follow has focused Black individuals due to the frequent follow of describing violent acts in rap lyrics, which are sometimes purely fictional.
“Freddy Mercury didn’t confess to having ‘simply killed a person’ by placing ‘a gun in opposition to his head’ and ‘’pulling the set off’,” Rep. Johnson stated in a press release.
“Bob Marley didn’t confess to having shot a sheriff. And Johnny Money didn’t confess to taking pictures ‘a person in Reno, simply to look at him die’.”
“Bob Marley didn’t confess to having shot a sheriff. And Johnny Money didn’t confess to taking pictures ‘a person in Reno, simply to look at him die’.”
Rep. Hank Johnson
Johnson cited analysis displaying no less than 820 situations of artistic works getting used as proof in prison trials. One of the crucial current situations concerned the prison trial of Atlanta rapper Jeffery Williams, aka Younger Thug, who was charged with working a prison group underneath RICO legal guidelines.
Prosecutors alleged that Williams headed up a prison gang referred to as YSL, or Younger Slime Life; attorneys for the rapper argued that YSL was truly Younger Stoner Life, a profitable report label that’s now an imprint of Warner Music.
A choose within the case dominated that prosecutors may use no less than 17 particular strains of lyrics from Younger Thug and different YSL artists as proof within the case. Williams’ attorneys argued that this was “racist and discrimination as a result of the jury can be so poisoned and prejudiced by these lyrics/poetry/artistry/speech” that it was tantamount to “illegal character assassination.”
Williams was launched final yr after reaching a plea deal underneath which he was sentenced to time served, which amounted to over 900 days behind bars.
The difficulty of lyrics as proof has additionally come up in Drake’s defamation lawsuit in opposition to Common Music Group over the lyrics of Kendrick Lamar’s 2024 hit Not Like Us, which Drake’s attorneys argue defamed the rapper and endangered him and his household.
In an amicus temporary filed in federal court docket final Might, a bunch of teachers urged the choose to dismiss the Drake vs. UMG case, arguing that taking rap lyrics as factual threatens freedom of speech and dangers a miscarriage of justice.
“Drake’s defamation declare rests on the belief that each phrase of Not Like Us needs to be taken actually, as a factual illustration,” the lecturers wrote.
“This assumption isn’t just defective—it’s harmful.”
The RAP Act was first launched in Congress in 2022 by Rep. Johnson and New York Democratic Rep. Jamaal Bowman, however the invoice did not make it out of subcommittee and was by no means delivered to a vote on the ground of the Home.
The invoice’s backers are hopeful it’ll acquire extra momentum this time round.
“Weaponizing lyrics or different artistic works in court docket is a dangerous tactic that stifles inventive expression and undermines the voices of not simply musicians, however all who create and form tradition,” stated Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason Jr.
“With the reintroduction of the RAP Act, we proceed to construct momentum for ending this unjust follow.”
“With the reintroduction of the RAP Act, we proceed to construct momentum for ending this unjust follow.”
Harvey Mason Jr., Recording Academy
“Musical lyrics of all genres could be alliterative, fantastical, boastful and at instances, even hyperbolic. However what they aren’t supposed to be – or marketed as – is ‘fact’,” stated Jeffrey Harleston, Normal Counsel and EVP, Enterprise & Authorized Affairs at Common Music Group.
“Prosecutorial ways that use lyrics as ‘proof’ of guilt with out regard to due course of and the liberty of expression are deeply disturbing and we commend Rating Member Johnson for introducing the RAP Act, a commonsense safety in opposition to this troubling follow.”
RIAA President and COO Michele Ballantyne stated the laws “will permit all creators to comply with their inventive imaginative and prescient with out obstacles of prejudice. All too usually Rap and Hip-Hop artists have been punished for a similar sort of hyperbole and imagery different genres routinely use with out consequence. Courts ought to take into account relevance, not assumptions.”Music Enterprise Worldwide
