Cyrus’ Flowers responds with: “I can buy myself flowers/Write my name in the sand/Talk to myself for hours/Say things you don’t understand/I can take myself dancing/I can hold my own hand.”
On November 20, Cyrus’ legal team filed a motion in California’s Central District Court to dismiss the lawsuit.
Tempo Music Investments owns its share of the rights to Mars’ song through the acquisition of songwriter Philip Lawrence’s catalog. However, Cyrus’ attorneys argue the case should be dismissed because Tempo represents only one of the four co-writers of When I Was Your Man (the others being Mars, Ari Levine, and Andrew Wyatt). According to Cyrus’ legal team, copyright law permits only a “legal or beneficial owner of an exclusive copyright” to sue for infringement.
Moreover, her lawyers contend that while the two songs share basic “musical building blocks,” there are significant differences in melody, chords, lyrics, and other musical elements, which undermine the validity of the lawsuit.
Here’s the music video of When I Was Your Man by Bruno Mars and Flower by Miley Cyrus:
