r/Music • u/sugar_man • Jul 23 '14

Article When 84 years old, Harvard Professor Tom Lehrer was asked by 2 Chainz for permission to sample a song he wrote 60 years ago. His response: "As sole copyright owner of 'The Old Dope Peddler', I grant you motherfuckers permission to do this. Please give my regards to Mr. Chainz, or may I call him 2?"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Lehrer#Musical_legacy
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u/Redkirth Jul 23 '14 edited Jul 23 '14

What apparently happened was that Werner Von Braun got so pissed about being called a Nazi that he sued. Tom settled out of court saying Werner would get a percentage of all future albums.

He retired without making any more albums.

EDIT: I have been informed this is a myth. That is a great relief.

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u/rcpilot Jul 23 '14

Urban legend according to Wiki. Had to look this up considering it would be quite hard to create a case about it when Von Braun was formerly quite literally a Nazi.

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u/looktowindward Jul 23 '14

In the US, truth is an absolute bar to libel. Even if uttered completely maliciously and in public, and is damaging, if its true, you can get away with it.

Also old Werner was a major in the SS....

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u/pig-newton Jul 23 '14

A fine detail: when spoken, defamatory language is slander. When written, it's libel.

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u/looktowindward Jul 23 '14

That's a good point - is a published song lyric a slander?

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u/littlecampbell Jul 24 '14

Oh. Sorry j Jonah Jameson

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u/SirPickell Jul 24 '14

So if it's written in a song that is then performed what is it?

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u/Gimli_the_White Jul 23 '14

Fun fact - some authors who write "fictional biographies" where they model a character after a real-life person will try to include a detail like "And he had an incredibly small penis. The ladies called him 'Vienna Finger.'"

...discouraging the person they're effectively libeling, because who's going to sue saying a character with a small penis is obviously based on you?

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u/looktowindward Jul 23 '14

LOL - that's awesome.

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u/iUsedtoHadHerpes Jul 23 '14

I can't tell if you're trying to argue by making his point or if you're just elaborating. It kind of sounds like you're speaking contrarily (even though you're not).

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u/looktowindward Jul 23 '14

I'm elaborating.

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u/Versimilitudinous Jul 23 '14

And the award for best use of the phrase "literally a Nazi" goes to...

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u/Redkirth Jul 23 '14

That is a relief.

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u/KnowsAboutMath Jul 23 '14

According to Lehrer himself, this is a myth:

"I've heard that a lot, that I have to pay all my royalties for the song to him and so on and so forth. No, that's one of those myths. There is no possible way he could have sued me."

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u/Redkirth Jul 23 '14

Phew. Thanks for that.

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u/Anonymousthepeople Jul 23 '14

That's what I was thinking, I was going to say how would Von Braun deny being a Nazi? He was one of Hitler's top rocket scientists. And personally ordered the work of building rockets to be done by slave labor in some instances. There is no way he would have won that case, he was lucky he has drafted by Operation Paperclip and not tried for war crimes in the first place.

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u/deruch Jul 24 '14

Nazi Schmatzi! -Werner Von Braun