Johnny Depp accused of stealing lyrics

Los Angeles: American actor-musician Johnny Depp and Jeff Beck have been accused of lifting lyrics for their song 'Sad Motherf***in' Parade'.

According to Variety, a report from Rolling Stone stated that the duo has been accused of lifting the song from an obscure "toast" sung by an incarcerated man and documented and released by a folklorist in 1974. A large number of lyrics of the Depp/Beck song '18' are strikingly similar to lines from a toast, an often-profane form of Black folk poetry from years past, called `Hobo Ben`.

Apparently, it had been written by a man named Slim Wilson who was serving an armed-robbery sentence at Missouri State Penitentiary, and documented by Bruce Jackson in his 1974 book about toasts, 'Get Your Ass in the Water and Swim Like Me', and a companion album. Wilson, whose name is a pseudonym, is not listed in the song's credits, reported Variety.

In the toast, 'Hobo Ben', the man in the song's title is at a party and says, "'Ladies of culture and beauty so refined, is there one among you that would grant me wine? / I'm raggedy I know, but I have no stink/and God bless the lady that 'll buy me a drink.'/ Heavy-hipted Hattie turned to Nadine with a laugh/and said, 'What that funky motherfucker really need, child, is a bath'.

"`Sad Motherf***in` Parade` includes similar lines such as "I`m raggedy, I know, but I have no stink," "God bless the lady that`ll buy me a drink," and "What that funky motherf***er really needs, child, is a bath."

"The only two lines I could find in the whole piece that [Depp and Beck] contributed are 'Big time motherf***er' and 'Bust it down to my level,'" Jackson told Rolling Stone, as per Variety.

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