Negativland Should Be Free Analysis

Music Should Be Free Today, copyright infringement has become a big controversial issue in the society. In the late 1980’s, Negativland sampled a part of U2’s song, “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for”, into its own music. They also used the letter “U” and number “2” in their name of the album cover. U2’s record label, Island Record, believed that Negativland was stealing U2’s rhythm because Negativland never asked for permission to use their song. However, Negativland’s record label, SST records, claimed that they have the freedom of expression, and that it’s new music they’ve created to publish. In a similar case, Danger Mouse mixed the vocal from Jay-Z’s The Black Album and the beats from the Beatles’ The White Album to create The Grey Album. As a result, the original artists sued Danger Mouse and all of Grey Album was forfeited. Some people think
Sometimes, borrowing music can cause a negative impact to the audience, but it does not mean that the borrowing of music destroys the original music. For example, the music Negativland borrowed included some curses and rude language (U2’s Double Trouble 139). U2 did not use this kind of “negative” language/material before, but it does not mean this kind of music should be prohibited. Modern people might enjoy listening to this style of music because it expresses and agrees with what they think of their currently unsatisfied situations. Similarly, a Chinese band, S.H.E, used the same melody of Mozart’s Symphony #40’s first movement, and then changed the symphony into a vocal song. Before, the Symphony #40 only can be played by the instrument, but now it can also be sung thanks to the band. Therefore, artistic borrowing is acceptable because it can reformat the old works to be more flexible as well as helping reminding the younger generation of the old, classical