Rick Astley settles lawsuit against Yung Gravy over ‘Betty’ vocals

Rick Astley has settled a months-long lawsuit with American rapper Yung Gravy over the use of his song ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’ in Gravy’s 2022 single ‘Betty (Get Money)’.

Deadline reports that an attorney for Yung Gravy had filed court papers with Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Elaine Mandel this past Tuesday (September 22), which stated the case was resolved on Friday September 22.

No further details were divulged, however, and neither Gravy nor Astley – or representatives from their respective legal teams – have commented on the suit since the news of its settlement was made public.

In January, Astley sued Yung Gravy – real name Matthew Hauri – on the grounds of his vocals being imitated on ‘Betty’ without authorisation.

The suit alleged that in the terms of clearing the sample of ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’ for the song, Hauri and his co-producers were allowed to replicate the instrumental of the song and interpolate its chorus melody for its own hook. As such, the original songwriting team of Stock Aitken Waterman were given writers’ credits. They were not, however, given clearance to directly sample the song itself.

Astley’s legal team alleged that Hauri brought in Nick Seeley – who co-produced the song – to imitate Astley’s voice for ‘Betty’. An Instagram video was used as evidence, in which Seeley allegedly discussed how he wanted his vocals to “sound identical” to the original track.

“A license to use the original underlying musical composition does not authorise the stealing of the artist’s voice in the original recording,” the suit read. “Instead, they resorted to theft of Mr. Astley’s voice without a license and without agreement.”

‘Betty (Get Money)’ was released in June 2022 as the lead single from Yung Gravy’s third studio album, ‘Marvelous’. It became his most popular single to date, and saw him chart on the Billboard Hot 100 for the first time in his career. The song was also certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

Astley has spent 2023 touring in support of his forthcoming studio album, ‘Are We There Yet?’ This included performing two separate sets at Glastonbury: One of his own material, and one with the indie band Blossoms in which they covered the songs of The Smiths.

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