According to Kidd Wes, he uploaded his track to SoundCloud in 2016 and then released it on YouTube only a few months later. Right now it boasts a solid 210,000 views on YouTube. And further according to Wes, he also registered the song with the U.S Copyright Office in May 2017. He also planned for it to be the lead single on an upcoming album.
On the other side of the coin, Gambino ended up releasing ‘This Is America’ in 2018 and as the story goes he went on to with Record of the Year for it.
Let’s just begin with pointing out all the ridiculously obvious similarities in the tracks. First of all their names, three word titles relating to America. The flow of the rap in the songs also sounds way too familiar – you literally couldn’t listen to ‘Made In America’ without thinking… have I heard this before?
According to TMZ who have been able to suss out the legal docs in relation to the lawsuit, Wes’ claims cover the fact that the “flow” is similar, as well claiming that the chorus/hook are also very similar. The doc reads, “unmistakably substantially similar, if not practically identical”.
It also directly references a set of lyrics from each song. From ‘Made In America: “Made in America / Flex on the radio / Made me a terrorist / Pessimistic n***as / You should just cherish this”. Versus ‘This Is America’:“This is America / Guns in my area / I got the strap / I gotta carry ’em”.
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Watch ‘Made In America’ by Kidd Wes.
