Crystal Castles Accused Of Stealing Songs
Tuesday May 06, 2008 @ 08:00 PM
By: ChartAttack.com Staff

Crystal Castles

Crystal Castles have been involved in a lengthy dispute with artist Trevor Brown over their appropriation of a piece of his art without permission or compensation. Now the Toronto electro-punk duo are being accused of ripping off other musicians for their song material.

Members of the 8-bit collective have alleged that Crystal Castles' "Insecticon" features rearranged parts of Lo-Bat's "My Little Droid Needs A Hand," and that they took the music without permission and haven't credited its original creator. Others claim that the Canadian campus radio chart-topping group's "Love And Caring" similarly steals the beat from Covox's "Sunday." The 8-bit collective is largely made up of people in the "chiptune" community who create music with computer or video game console sound chips, like Crystal Castles. The discussion and analysis of Crystal Castles' alleged plagiarism has now spread to other blogs and websites.

The two songs in question are covered by Creative Commons licenses, which encourage file-sharing. But such licenses specifically require crediting the original creator, non-commercial use and the derivative work being released under the same license. Crystal Castles haven't met any of those obligations, which could land them in trouble if it's proven they actually plagiarized.

"Insecticon" appears on the Crystal Castles/Lies Records MySpace page. Its credits were recently changed from just the group name to "CC vs. Lo-Bat" after the controversy arose.

Trent Reznor will probably be keeping a close watch to make sure that his dressing room deli trays don't go missing when Crystal Castles' Ethan Kath and Alice Glass open for Nine Inch Nails on these Canadian dates:

• July 28 Edmonton, AB @ Rexall Place
• July 29 Calgary, AB @ Pengrowth Saddledome
• July 31 Winnipeg, MB @ MTS Centre