'Blurred Lines': Marvin Gaye's Family Declined Settlement

Robin Thicke’s team reportedly made Marvin Gaye’s family a six-figure offer in an effort to avert a nasty copyright-infringement battle, but the family rejected it, Billboard reports. Suggested Reading Black Nurse Details Terror, Heroism After Plane Crash on LaGuardia Runway Brandy Reveals Her Last Conversation With Whitney Houston The Day Before Her Death The Chilling…

Robin Thicke’s team reportedly made Marvin Gaye’s family a six-figure offer in an effort to avert a nasty copyright-infringement battle, but the family rejected it, Billboard reports.

Video will return here when scrolled back into view
17 Fashion Trainwrecks from Met Gala 2025

According to sources knowledgeable with the lawsuit, the settlement offer came after Frankie Christian Gaye, Marvin Gaye III and Nona Marvisa Gaye accused Thicke’s “Blurred Lines” hit single of plagiarizing “Got To Give it Up,” written and composed by Marvin Gaye, who died in 1984.

Subsequently, Thicke, along with “Blurred Lines” co-writers Pharrell Williams and Clifford Harris, Jr., filed a lawsuit on Aug. 15 in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles requesting a ruling that “Blurred Lines” does not infringe on “Got To Give It Up.” It also requested a similar judgement with regard to another accusation, by Bridgeport Music Inc., that “Blurred Lines” infringed on George Clinton’s “Sexy Ways.” 

Read more at Billboard

Straight From The Root

Sign up for our free daily newsletter.