A Christian rapper, Flame, has sued Katy Perry for ripping off his 2008 track Joyful Noise for her mega-hit Dark Horse in Missouri District Court on Tuesday.
The 32-year-old hip-hop artist – who studied in a seminary – claimed that his secular song’s high-pitched techno melody and snap-based beat were slowed down for Katy’s ode to the 1996 film The Craft. And that his track, Joyful Noise has been ‘irreparably tarnished by its association with the
witchcraft, paganism, black magic, and Illuminati imagery evoked by the same music in Dark Horse.’
The song by Flame – born Marcus T. Gray – scored a Gospel Music Association Dove Award nod and its album Our World: Redeemed earned a Grammy nomination. Dark Horse – written from the perspective of a witch – sold 6 million copies and the Egyptian-themed music video amassed 439 million views.
